


Small Comforts

by heartbeatstumbles, LeafFic, orphan_account



Category: Naruto
Genre: Bittersweet, Childhood Trauma, F/M, Family Drama, First Love, Friendship turned romance, Grief, Hurt/Comfort, Loss, PTSD, Romance, Sweet, Trauma, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Widowed, kakasaku - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-06-23
Packaged: 2019-10-28 17:43:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 40
Words: 83,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17791889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartbeatstumbles/pseuds/heartbeatstumbles, https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeafFic/pseuds/LeafFic, https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: "Beware the old man in a profession where men die young." When Sakura discovers she's been a widow for a year and half, she doesn't cry. In search of her grief, she reaches out to the man most similar to Sasuke, her ex-sensei, Kakashi. A notorious playboy, she doesn't expect him to become attached to her. Worse yet, for her to become attached to him. (Rated M for lemons)





	1. Chapter 1

"Beware the old man in a profession where men die young."

OoO*OoO*OoO

Hatake Kakashi breathed hard as he stood, his joints aching in ways they hadn't when he was thirty years younger. Hell, they hadn't hurt that badly ten years ago. He shook the blood off his fingertips that still twitched with the lingering effects of his chidori. Three rogue ninja lay dead at his feet. One was on his way to dying. He looked down at the young man, who drew shallow, gasping breaths. What was he? Nineteen? Twenty? ANBU drew in and one of their medics started to treat the dying ninja. It is sometimes easier to extract information from living people, after all. They would kill him when it was all over.

"I'm getting too old for this," Kakashi muttered to himself. He rotated his sore shoulder as he walked through the woods towards their encampment. In two months he would be fifty-one. Although rumor had it that he didn't age, Kakashi knew it was only one of the rare benefits of having been born with silver hair. When he studied his face in the mirror, he noticed the creases around his eyes, the slight furrow that now was a permanent feature above the bridge of his nose, the lines around his mouth from smiles he had rarely felt. The outward appearance wasn't nearly as worn as he felt inside, though. Besides aching joints and injuries that seemed to linger for weeks rather than days, his spirit felt stretched too thin. How many active duty ninja lived to be fifty? He could count them on both hands and have a few fingers left over.

He got to camp just in time to see a messenger hawk land on its perch. His eyes narrowed. With the kind of luck he'd been having the last six months, it would be another assignment. What he really wanted was a few weeks off. Was that too much to ask? He was a little rougher than necessary taking the note out its cylinder, and had he been a slower person, the bird's angry beak would have probably took off one of his fingers.

The note was short, to the point, and directed at him. He recognized Naruto's sloppy handwriting immediately. "Kakashi-sensei, we found Sasuke's body. Please come home."

Kakashi cursed under his breath. For many people, a two year absence would have been cause for alarm, but with Sasuke Uchiha no one had worried about him until he didn't answer a letter four months prior. His only child, Sarada, had written him to tell him that she'd made jounin. He had never written back. Even then, it didn't cause immediate panic.

When ANBU returned, they found his tent gone and a note nailed to a nearby tree with a shuriken that simply read, "Hokage requests me back in Konaha."

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura Uchiha sat at the end of their bed in their darkened bedroom. Yesterday it felt like her bedroom. Yesterday it had been her bed. And now it was his. Theirs. It was almost funny when Sakura thought about it.

Sarada had left an hour before. She seemed to be handling it well. At least, she'd been handling it normally. She'd sobbed and cursed at his ghost, then she'd wiped her eyes and put on a brave face. Because that's what you do when the father you barely know dies.

Drawing a deep breath, Sakura ran her fingertips over the stitches of the quilt on their bed. She should be crying. Widows cry, even the widows of ninja, who knew their husbands might die at any moment. They cried. Her mind went back to when she was a young girl and the tears came so easily that they almost felt like a curse. But that had been before she'd lost him so many times. A thousand tiny deaths.

They had found his skull and a handful of other bones in a shallow grave. How he'd died and who had buried him remained a mystery for the moment. The medical nin who'd examined his remains had estimated that he'd died about a year and a half before. The grave had been scavenged by animals. There was a chance that no one would ever know how he died.

She felt like she was drowning.

Drowning?

No, he was a strong swimmer.

If he'd died at the hands of enemies there would have been no way they'd have buried the body in the woods.

What if he'd been sick or hurt and died alone only to buried by some passerby who knew nothing about him?

The scenarios played out in her mind like a sickening slideshow, but the tears still didn't sting her eyes. I'm a monster, she thought as she stood up and walked to the window. On the sill was that picture of them, back when they were twelve and she was infatuated with him and he hated her. The corner of her lips quirked up for the briefest of moments as she ran her finger over the image of his scowling face.

Over the years, she believed that he'd grown to love her as much as he was able to love anyone. It wasn't the romantic kind of love she'd dreamed of when she was standing beside him that picture, but what that twelve-year-old girl hadn't understood was that the boy she was obsessed with was profoundly broken. His heart, his spirit, his mind. No matter how much progress he made, he would always be either fighting ghosts or running from them. To outsiders, he may have seemed selfish and unfeeling, leaving his family the way he always did, but she knew better. He didn't leave because he didn't feel anything, he left because he felt everything too deeply.

There is only so much pain a man can take, after all.

And maybe now she was just like him, she mused, because she knew that she should be hurting more than she was. There was only the same familiar dull ache, the old loneliness. It was as if her mind could not piece together that the bones she'd seen laying on the sterile steel table were truly her husband's. Maybe her mind could, and her heart couldn't.

The funeral would be the next day.

She went to their closet, the one that was full of her clothes, and picked out a black dress. She'd bought it about a year and a half ago, as if the universe had whispered in her ear that this day was coming. Laying it out on the bed, she paused and listened as if maybe she'd hear him whispering in the darkness. The house as silent. No, she thought, if Sasuke were a ghost, he wouldn't spend his afterlife haunting me.

Her lip quirked up again for the briefest moment as she smoothed the black taffeta, then turned and walked out the door, shutting it behind her. She would sleep on the sofa, not because the bed reminded her of him, but because it didn't and somehow that hurt a little more.


	2. Chapter 2

Sakura woke in the dark living room at 3:42. Tilting her head upward, she squinted up at the star-filled sky. She closed her eyes again, testing whether or not sleep would return, but was unsurprised that her body refused to relax. Sitting up, she cradled her head in her hands for a long moment as she stared down at her bare feet on the shag rug. Sasuke had hated that rug. He said it felt like he was walking on a dog. It, like so many other things in the house, was hers.

She went to their bedroom without bothering to flick on the light and changed into a dark set of jogging pants and a black t-shirt. Pulling her hair into a sloppy bun, she slid on her sandals. She didn't bother locking the door as she walked out into the early morning chill. Wrapping her arms tightly around her waist, she walked towards the funeral home.

The service would be by the graveside, but his casket was in a backroom, and Sakura deftly picked the lock, slipping in through a poorly lit door. She'd always hated the smell of funeral homes; too much potpourri to block out the smell of embalming fluids, the stale smell of incense burned days before, lingering perfume from mourners. But she didn't think of that as she walked into the windowless back room. She turned on the single, bare bulb that hung in the middle.

There were four tables, but only one had a casket. It was black ebony, with silver hinges and handles. She ran her fingers over the smooth surface before she opened it. His bones were laid out there carefully, the skull on the pillow, the ribs approximately where they would have been, a femur further down. Her lips pursed together as she looked down at them. The examiners who positively identified him were the best in their field, and she trusted them, but as she gently lifted Sasuke's skull, she couldn't make herself believe that it was really him.

Gingerly moving the bones to one side, she climbed up and lay down in the casket beside them. Despite the padding, it was as hard and unyielding death itself. She ran her fingers down the side of the skull as she stared into the empty eye sockets. "Where are you?" she whispered. She was touching his last remains, but it felt as if he were really just off on another mission. It was like one day, maybe months or years away, he would just stroll back into Konoha.

The door opened, and Sakura froze. She could tell the chakra signal before she even sat up and saw Naruto's red-rimmed eyes. "Couldn't sleep either?" she asked sheepishly as she climbed out the casket.

"I can't really believe he's gone," Naruto said as he watched her put the bones back into place. "I should have sent someone to check on him earlier."

Sakura shook her head without looking at him. "He wouldn't have wanted that."

And they both knew it was the truth.

"He was one- one of the best."

Sakura nodded as she leaned over and wrapped her arm around Naruto's waist, resting her head against his shoulder. "Yeah, he really was."

"You know what I remember? Back when we were kids, and I kept trying to show I was better than him." He laughed, and she could feel him shake his head. "Man, I really couldn't stand him."

"I think the feeling was mutual." Sakura chuckled. Sasuke had hated just about everyone then, or so it seemed at the time. What he really hated, she later learned, was the hand he'd been dealt and his own inability to alter it. He cursed himself for far too many years.

Sakura wished she could have confided her fears in Naruto, but she knew he wouldn't understand. She wanted to be able to say that she didn't know what she'd do without Sasuke, but she did because she'd been doing it for decades. She wanted to be helpless in that moment. She wanted to want to die. How was it that living felt like such a betrayal? Of course, she knew the answer to that. She'd seen it too often in her patients at the Children's Mental Health Hospital. It was survivor's guilt.

She wished her eyes would sting.

Her heart hurt. It ached for her husband and the knowledge that he'd died, seemingly alone, then had been perhaps hastily and carelessly buried only to have the grave desecrated. She could picture him standing in front of her, the faint smile barely pulling up the corners of his lips. Those were his most honest smiles. He would have given her one of those if he'd have been there then to reassure her that he was okay. She knew he would have. "I miss him," she said just above a whisper.

"Me too."

OoO*OoO*OoO

The next morning Sakura and Sarada were at the graveyard at nine, an hour before the service was going to begin. In some ways, Sakura had hoped it would rain. The dark gloom would have suited both her husband's spirit and her current mood more than the unyielding sun that was rising in the pristine sky. This was better for Sarada, though, she knew. Perhaps Sasuke had some hand in it. He had truly cared for his daughter, despite the fears the girl had had when she was younger. Her father had always cared.

There was a sizable crowd there already, many of them come to pay respects to a man they barely even knew, but they knew Sakura and Sarada. Maybe funerals were truly for the living, Sakura mused as her eyes roamed over the mourners. A lean silhouette far in the back caught her eye, and she had to look twice.

Kakashi Hatake was not on time for anything, much less early, but there he was, all in black, his half-lidded eyes staring at the memorial stone. Sakura excused herself from the woman she'd been talking with and walked around the throng of mourners towards him. "I thought you were out of country, looking for information about Danzo," she said softly.

"Naruto wrote me." His black eyes locked on hers.

She waited for him to say something generic like, "I'm sorry for your loss," or "He'll never be forgotten," but he didn't. His gaze went back to the memorial stone, and she felt something tap against her hand. She looked down to see a metal flask between his fingertips. Turning her back to the crowd, she took a quick swig of the liquor that burned all the way down her throat.

"Thanks," she whispered as she discreetly handed it back to him.

"Any time."

She looked back towards the mourners. "I should go back."

"Yes," he said almost like a sigh. "I suppose you should."

"I'll see you around."

He nodded as she turned and walked back to the crowd.

Once, long ago they'd all gone out in search of Sasuke. Team 7. She and Naruto and Kakashi. It was when she was just beginning to see Sasuke's brokenness, although she wouldn't truly understand it for years to come. His darkness terrified her, but like all darkness, it only made the light seem a bit brighter. All of them had seen both sides of him.

It was as easy as ever to spot Naruto, now wearing the esteemed, white robes of the Hokage. He was walking through the crowd, hugging people, crying and laughing with them. It was strange what loss did to people, she thought as she glanced back over her shoulder at Kakashi then searched for her daughter. Sarada had her arm wrapped around ChoCho's waist, her head rested on the girl's shoulder as she spoke with a few other members of her class. You see, Sasuke, Sakura thought. She'll be fine; you don't have to worry. Because he had worried, back when she was younger and brooding. He'd been afraid that maybe she'd find it as hard as he did to connect with people, but just like Naruto had for him, the Lord Seventh had opened Sarada's eyes to the importance of other people. She'll be fine.

We'll all be fine.

Sakura's lips quirked up in a smile as she thought of the way the two boys had influenced each other, both for the better. Neither would have turned into the people they had without the other.

Overhead a flock of birds called to each other just as the ceremony started. Sakura looked up at them, black wings furling as the birds spun around each other, the flock forming patterns in the sky as they drifted further from view. She watched them until they were gone, just like she'd always watched Sasuke leave. He was a thing of beauty, her husband, but like that flock of birds, no person could have held him bound. Perhaps they could have captured a piece or two of him for a while, but there were always a few pieces of his spirit that couldn't be held.

And now he was free.

No more hatred.

No more fear.

Just freedom.

Forever.


	3. Chapter 3

The phone rang as Sakura was about to leave for lunch two days after the funeral. With a sigh, she walked back into the office, taking note of the light blinking from the rarely used ER. "Director Uchiha. Can I help you?"

"Could you come down here? There's someone we think you need to see," the medic on the other end said.

"Of course."

The ER was located on the ground floor, near the back of the clinic. She took the back corridors to it, partially to save time, partially to avoid the medics who'd been a bit overbearing with their misguided sympathies. She expected to a ruckus when she opened the heavy metal door, but there was silence. She followed the chakra signal towards room 3 and unlocked the door.

A girl was crouched down in the corner of the room, her eyes somewhere between furious and terrified. How often those two are coupled, Sakura mused as she ignored the two medics standing on either side of the door as she walked towards the girl. "Hello," she said as she crouched down about six feet in front of the girl. "What's your name?"

Apprehension and silence.

"I'm Dr. Sakura. Do you know where you are?"

Silence.

"I'm going to talk to these two gentlemen, but if you need anything, I'm right here to talk to you. Okay?"

Blink.

She stood and walked to the medics, without losing her focus on the girl. "Any idea who she is?" she whispered. That was when she caught sight of it.

A black traveling cloak was folded in one of the men's hands. She knew that cloak. Grabbing it, she pulled it towards her. It didn't smell like Sasuke anymore, but it was his. There was the hole she'd noticed the last time he was in, the one she'd meant to patch, but never got around to it. How many things had she never gotten around to?

Her eyes stung.

Damn it all.

"We found her with this," she heard the medic say, "in the woods, near where he was found."

Near where Sasuke's bones were found. This girl, whoever she was, had seen him in his last days, or maybe days after his last days. It didn't matter. This girl knew things that Sakura needed to know. Drawing a deep breath, Sakura turned back to the child, whose angry eyes had never left her. "Do you know who gave you this cloak?" she asked as she bent down again to meet the girl's eyes.

The girl grabbed for the cloak, but Sakura pulled it away. "Did you find this cloak?"

"Fire Eyes give," the girl said in a voice that sounded as if it had not be used in quite some time.

Fire Eyes. The sharingan. "Where is Fire Eyes now?"

The girl's gaze softened by the minutest of degrees, her eyes darting to the cloak then to the medics then back to Sakura.

"Where is Fire Eyes now?" Sakura repeated a bit more forcefully.

"They take!" The girl shouted, pointing her finger towards the medics. Her chakra coiled inside her as if she were about to strike at any moment. "They take Fire Eyes. They hurt Chie."

Sakura ran her thumb over the cloak one more time, then held it out to the girl. "Your name is Chie?" she asked as the girl snatched it, holding it to her face.

Chie nodded, wrapping the cloak around her like a blanket.

"How old are you?" She looked to be about nine or ten, maybe eleven if she were short.

Chie cocked her head to the side.

Sakura tried a different question. "Did you live in the woods, with Fire Eyes? Did he take care of you?"

"Save. Fire Eyes save Chie. Chie no save Fire Eyes." Tears began to form in her eyes. "Monsters take. Wolves take. Men take."

"I knew Fire Eyes," Sakura said softly as she watched the girl begin to rock softly. "He was my friend. Fire Eyes would not be angry with Chie."

Chie played with the button hole of the cloak as she rocked, but Sakura knew the girl understood at least some of the words, and the sentiment behind them.

"Do you know where your parents are? Your mother and father?"

"Dirt and stones," Chie said. "Dirt and stones like Fire Eyes."

She began to understand. There were so many orphans from the last war, how hard would it have been for one to slip through the cracks? Perhaps she'd been orphaned as a small child and survived, semi-feral, in the woods until Sasuke had found her. What had he saved her from? Who were the monsters Chie spoke of? Sakura took a couple of steps towards Chie and put out her hand slowly. She smiled as Chie allowed her to run her hand down the side of her face. "Chie is safe now," Sakura said.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Chie was sedated so that she could sleep. Sakura had left Sasuke's cloak with her, and the last she'd seen the girl was curled up under it in the corner of her room. "Let her sleep there for now," Sakura had told the night shift nurses as she looked at the little girl through the window. "Eventually she'll learn that the bed is for sleeping. I'll be in to check on her in the morning."

For some reason, the prospect of returning to an empty house weighed heavier on Sakura than it normally did when she left the hospital. She found herself walking towards The Broken Cup, a dive bar many of Konoha's ninja frequented. It was more low-key than the nightclubs in the civilian district, just a nice, quiet place to drink away whatever sorrows the day had brought. And for ninja, there were usually plenty of sorrows.

"Hey, Forehead," Ino said, bumping Sakura's shoulder as she walked up to her.

"Evening, Pig," Sakura said, smiling as the other woman passed a glass to her. Other people may not understand their friendship, but despite their near constant insults, Ino remained one of Sakura's best friend. "Got a break today."

Ino's eyebrow rose slightly.

"They brought in a little girl with Sasuke's travel cloak. Her name's Chie, and apparently she was the one who buried him."

The blonde's eyes widened in shock, but she said nothing as Sakura told her all the things she knew so far.

"At least I know he wasn't alone at the end," Sakura said as she tilted her glass, watching the way the neon lights played over the glass and amber liquid inside. "That's something."

"Yeah, I think that was the worst part," Ino said, almost to herself, "thinking he was alone when he..."

"Died," Sakura finished her thought. Not unkindly, just with the patient kind of resolution that comes from knowing that one faces a situation that is impossible to change. Sasuke was dead. The little girl sleeping in the hospital was, perhaps, the only clue to how he died. Those were the facts.

"Are you okay?

Normally that would have been answered with the knee jerk response, "Sure," or something like it, but Ino knew Sakura too well for that. "Probably not," Sakura said, "but I think I will be."

"Yeah, I think you will too," Ino agreed as she refilled Sakura's glass.

From across the bar, Sakura saw a male ninja eyeing Ino. "I think someone wants your attention," Sakura said, tilting the rim of her glass towards him.

Ino scoffed. "I can't leave you here all by yourself."

Quickly scanning the bar, Sakura spotted Kakashi sitting alone in the back. "I need to go talk with Kakashi-sensei anyway," she said with, what she hoped was, a reassuring smile. "Go have fun, or whatever it is you do."

OoO*OoO*OoO

It wasn't as if Sakura Uchiha were the last person Kakashi expected to see at The Broken Cup, it was just that he hoped she wouldn't come up to him if she did happen to stop in for a drink or two. But he smiled at her as she approached, the same eye-creasing smile he often wore, the one he didn't really feel. "Yo," he said, giving her a little two finger salute.

"Hey," she said as she slid into the chair across from him. She glanced over her shoulder at Ino, who already had her hand on the man's shoulder as she giggled. "She wastes no time. Pig."

"So am I to understand that you didn't come here for my riveting conversational skills?" There was an airy quality to his voice and another fake smile.

But if Sakura noticed, she didn't let on. She chuckled softly. "I never really considered you a conversationalist."

No, after the last time they spent any considerable amount of time together, he would imagine that she didn't. It had started in that very bar, after all, surely she remembered it. It had only been six months before, after he'd gotten back from a particularly bad mission. He and Genma had been drinking, and of course, Genma being Genma, he'd left with some red-headed woman. Kakashi didn't really remember what happened after that that caused the bouncers to throw him out onto the street, but he remembered Sakura blotting away blood from his forehead just before she hoisted him to his feet. She'd walked him home. "You know," he remembered saying as she lay him in his bed, "if you weren't married to Sasuke, I'd take you right here, right now."

He'd reached out and pushed her pink hair back behind her ear and maybe if she'd have given him the chance he would have kissed her, but she'd pushed him away with a nervous chuckle. "Flattering, very flattering, but you're drunk and I'm both too married and too tired for any of that tonight."

The next morning he'd woken with a splitting headache and the horrifying knowledge that he'd succeeded at both unsuccessfully hitting on his ex-pupil and completely alienating one of his few good friends.

He considered his drink for a moment longer, but when he looked up there wasn't any disgust in her face. She was sitting with her legs crossed, running her forefinger over the rim of her glass as she swayed gently to the song that was playing on the radio. When had those small streaks of gray appeared in the hair at her temples? Her face still looked the same it had for years, maybe a little thinner, definitely more stoic, but enough so that Kakashi hated himself for what he'd said to her the time she brought him home. "Listen about the time I got kicked out..."

"Would you really have?" she cut him off.

"What?"

She rested her elbows on the table, leaning in closer to him. Her voice was not suggestive, only curious. "Would you have had sex with me if I hadn't been married to Sasuke?"

Yes. Pathetic. "I was very drunk." Worse.

To his relief, she laughed as she downed the rest of her drink. "Yes, you were."

"Did I say anything else I shouldn't have?"

"Not really, although I found out your singing voice leaves a lot to be desired."

"I did not sing," he said indignantly. At least, he didn't think he'd sang.

"Well, no, not by most people's standards. Kind of sounded like someone had rocked on a cat's tail."

"You're a very mean woman," he joked, but her beautiful smile faltered. "I didn't really mean that."

"I know," she said softly as she rolled the empty glass over her palm. "Are you drunk?"

"Not enough to be insulting you. I'm sorry."

She set the empty glass down and rose. "Come with me." She walked out ahead of him, not looking back as they walked two blocks in silence. He wasn't expecting her to turn down a dark alley, or press him up against the brick wall. Her hand went up to his mask, and he didn't resist. When her fiery lips crashed on his, he didn't resist. Even though everything in his body told him that this was intrinsically wrong, he didn't do a thing to stop her. The nails of one hand clawed upward over his chest, leaving little electric pulses behind them as her other hand rubbed against his fast growing manhood.

"You don't want to do this here," he managed to pant against her lips.

"Your house is closer." There was no question in her voice, no request. This was not the girl he'd watched grow up, nor was it the dutiful wife of a wayward husband. In that dark ally on that night where the moon was only beginning to wax, Sakura was an goddess, and she ruled the universe.

She walked beside him, a foot of air between them as if they were simply friends who happened to be headed in the same direction. He stole a glance at her, but her face was unreadable. There were a thousand things he wanted to say to her, "Do you really want to do this?" was high among them, but he was afraid it would do more harm than good. One of two things would happen. Either she would be insulted that mistakenly thinking he didn't want to have sex with her when he was fairly sober or she would realize what an enormously stupid thing she was about to do and back out. Both options seemed equally horrible, so he walked beside her in silence.

When his house came into view he had the realization that the next morning nothing would be the same. It was like walking to the gallows but knowing that you'd wind up in heaven, only reversed. She stood a ways off when he unlocked the door and held it open for her, but as soon as the door was closed, she started to unbutton her shirt. Every filthy fantasy he'd entertained over the last few years was coming true before his eyes as she unhooked her bra, letting it fall away to reveal a pert set of creamy white breasts, the nipples taunt and begging for him to touch them. She hissed as he pinched the hardened nubs between his thumb and forefinger.

"You like that?" his whispered in her ear, then nibbled on her earlobe.

She answered by hiking her skirt up and grinding her warm, wet panties against his upper leg. Her nimble fingers undid his pants, and she looked up at him as she slowly dropped down to her knees. There was a small voice in his mind that screamed at him that this would only end badly, but as she pushed his pants and boxers down, freeing his hard flesh, he didn't care for anything past that moment. She cupped his balls in her small palm as she slowly licked up from them towards his sensitive tip. Her tongue meandered slowly as her gaze was locked on him. How could her eyes looked so innocent while her tongue was so wicked? He groaned with satisfaction, his fingers running through her pink locks as she took his head into her warm mouth. She began to hum softly as she went down, almost painfully slow at first so that he could feel every little feature of her mouth on his sensitive cock. Every move she made was heaven. When she began to go quicker, his balls began to tighten. Fuck, he didn't normally cum that quickly.

"Sakura, slow down," he ground out.

She looked up at him with a predatory gleam in her eyes as she let his dick pop out her mouth and slap against him, her slender fingers replacing her lips as they pumped it. "Why?" she sing-songed. "Surely the famous Copy-Nin has more than one round in him a night." And then her mouth was on him again, sucking hard as her tongue pressed against his shaft, rippling as she hummed.

There was no fighting it, even if he'd wanted to, and really he didn't. With each time she went down he got a little closer. This is wrong, the small voice shouted. But it was so right. "Sakura..." His hips bucked against her mouth involuntarily. "I'm... I'm close... I'm going to... Oh, God, I'm..."

Her eyes gazed up at him, hungry, as her mouth devoured him. That was the last thing he saw as his eyes closed, his cock swelling almost painfully. "Fuck!" His hot seed shot against the back of her throat, and she slowed, sucking each shot out of him as if it were the most delicious thing she'd ever tasted. He leaned against the wall, almost laughing as the euphoria washed over him. His eyes opened to see her licking him clean.

He bent down a little, helping her to her feet, then quickly kicked his pants away. He peeled his shirt off along with the mask, taking a moment to relish the way she stared at his face. "Come on," he said as he lifted her easily, carrying her like a bride towards his bedroom. Bride. I'm going to hell. Sasuke forgive me, he thought.

She giggled a little as he lay her on the bed. Her shirt was on the floor of the foyer, and he ran his fingers over the waistband of her skirt.

"Do you need some help?" She sounded amused.

"No," he said huskily as he slowly pulled the zipper down her hip, revealing a set of white lace panties. A bride. He was careful as he lifted her hips slightly, trailing the dark fabric down her silken legs. He had seen a lot of beautiful women in his life, but this woman laying there in nothing but her panties, the thin light from the window illuminating her, this woman was a goddess. And he would worship her.

His mouth went first to her lips, his hand playing with her nipple as he relished the taste of his cum on her tongue. He trailed kisses down her neck, over her collarbone as he slowly crawled backward. He took one nipple in his mouth, sucking on it while his hand squeezed the other one. Swirling his tongue around her hardened nub, he slowly licked down her abdomen, punctuating every few inches with a kiss over her scars. When he came to her panties the smell of her sex was almost tangible. It enveloped him like a blanket and made his cock rouse again with desire. His thumbs went under the thin band of lace over her hipbones and he slowly slipped the material down over her legs. It was sopping wet, he noticed, as he dropped it on the bed beside her just before he bowed down low again and began to kiss up from her knee.

She moaned as he got closer. He watched as her head tilted backward in primal desire as his mouth found the folds of her pussy. She was tart, but fresh as he drug his tongue over the cave of her womanhood. Her legs trembled. This was a woman who hadn't known pleasure in far too long. Her fingers laced into his hair as she pulled his face against her and he obliged. He found her pearl. "Oh, god, yes!" she cried as he began to suck on her clit hungrily. He wrapped his arms around her legs, drinking her in as her juices began to flow down his face. She came once, twice, a third time, but he would not relent until he heard her gasp, "I need you! I need you inside me!"

It didn't matter to him that she was using him. It didn't matter what was right or wrong or if the ground would open up and drag him to hell as soon as this were over. He climbed up on top of her, pushing the tip of his cock against her pussy. "Do it," she commanded him right before she pulled him down and kissed him.

She was so tight that it was almost painful, but as he drove into her again and again, waves of euphoria washed over him. Tucking her head onto his shoulder, she panted as she whispered into his ear, "Harder, Sensei." He drove into her, hooking her leg up on his elbow as he pushed so deeply that he felt her cervix. She began to whimper with pleasure, her pussy pulsing as he rode her.

"Cum for me," he commanded her, knowing full well that she was not a goddess to be ordered about.

"Cum inside me," she countered, her once innocent eyes now filled with passion and need.

And who was he to deny her. He was so close anyway. As she tightened around him again, biting his shoulder as her walls clenched around his cock, he gave three more ragged thrusts before pushing hard against her cervix his seed gushing into her like a fountain. Squirt after molten squirt broke into her waiting womb, rushing towards her core and causing her to scream his name with pleasure as she held onto him. He held himself up, pressed against her and breathing hard, but not crushing her as every nerve in his body quaked with pleasure. As they started to come down, she cradled his head, guiding him down to her breast and holding him as they both bathed in the afterglow.

Yes, this was worth going to hell.

OoO*OoO*OoO

They both fell asleep for a while. He woke when she stirred, but he pretended to keep sleeping. Maybe she was going to the bathroom, he thought, but he heard her pick up something from the floor and walk out towards the hallway. He listened as she walked down the hall, passed the kitchen and to the foyer. A few minutes later the front door opened. The click as the latch fell back into place was almost deafening.

What'd you expect? he asked himself as he rolled on his back and stared up at the white ceiling.

No one ever stayed until the morning. Sakura was no different.


	4. Chapter 4

One Year Ago...

Kakashi could think of a million things he would prefer to do than walk through the doors of the Children's Mental Health Clinic, but the night before he'd promised Sakura that he'd help her with her research. Psychiatrists were, perhaps, his least favorite form of medics, mostly because while others kept you from bleeding out and reset bones, psychiatrists never seemed to do any good at all. They just picked at old wounds that were better off pushed to the back of a person's mind.

Regardless his mild disdain for her profession, Sakura was a good friend, which was why he was knocking on her office door. A half hour late, but still. "Right on time," Sakura said with a knowing smirk as she ushered him into the well-lit office. It was painted a pale pink and had a plethora of plants; probably gifts from her best "frenemy," Ino, he thought.

He noticed that on her desk calendar, she'd marked his appointment a half hour later than the time she'd told him. She was good. He slouched into the chair opposite her. "So," he drew the word out as she opened a file.

"So, let's lay down some ground rules," she said, resting her arms on the file as she leaned a bit closer towards him. "Obviously I'm not your doctor, but I want you to know everything you tell me is confidential. Your name will be redacted in all the reports, and you'll only be referred to as a randomly selected case number."

"Charming."

She chuckled. "It's science. Anyway, you're not obliged to answer anything you're uncomfortable with, but I need you to be honest with me to insure the validity of my results. Hopefully this study will help a lot of kids."

"Sounds like the best reason to have my head shrunk I've heard of yet," he said with and eye crinkling smile.

Sakura shook her head with a faint smile. "So let's start at the very beginning. How do you feel about not knowing your mother?"

Ouch, he thought, but his expression didn't betray anything. "Who says I don't know my mother?" he countered.

For a moment she looked bewildered as she quickly scanned back over the papers. "Well... she's not listed in any of your paperwork and there is a note here about you having never met her when you were a child."

"Well, I didn't exactly promise my other shrinks I wouldn't lie."

"Noted."

He remembered well the day he'd finally gotten his father to admit who his mother was. Sakumo Hatake had only done so after Kakashi swore that he would never tell another soul who she was or approach her. The first day he'd seen her, she was shopping in the market with her two young children. Fumi Inuzuka was a beautiful woman, with long brown hair and a birthmark in exactly the same spot as Kakashi's. She seemed so kind and gentle with his half-siblings and for years, he imagined that if she could just meet him, she'd treat him the same way.

A few weeks after Rin died was the first time he ever broke his word to his father. It had been raining that night and he remembered standing in front of her door for fifteen minutes before he worked up the nerve to knock. He pulled his mask down to his neck, hoping that maybe she's recognize him.

The smile she'd answered the door with fell away quickly. Before she could say anything, he wrapped his arms around her, tucking his head on her shoulder. She bristled in his embrace, though, pushing him back onto the porch as she glanced over her shoulder quickly then stepped outside with him and shut the door. "What are you doing here?" she hissed.

"I just... I... Do you know who I am?"

"Of course I know who you are!" Her eyes were venomous. "Your father and I had an understanding that you were not going to contact me!"

"Dad's dead."

"Yes, I know." Her voice didn't grow warmer. "I'm going to ask again: What are you doing here?"

"I..." He searched her face for any faint glimmer of caring, but found none. "Nothing."

"Well, don't come back here," she hissed, "and keep that mask up. If you let anyone know I brought you into this world, I swear, I will be the one to take you out of it."

And with that, she walked back inside and slammed the door on his face. He dutifully pulled the mask back up; he no more wanted people to know that he was related to that woman than she wanted it.

It would have been better if I hadn't known her, he mused as he plucked a paperclip from the container on Sakura's desk and started rolling it end-over-end across his knuckles like a coin. "So, now that we know I don't have any mommy issues, shall we go onward?"

"Okay," she said pleasantly. "Let's talk about your childhood. What was it like in your home?"

"It was... warm," Kakashi said with a genuine smile. "Dad was an amazing father. He always encouraged me, was always there when I needed him..."

Sakura slightly raised an eyebrow as she waited.

"Until he wasn't," he added with a sigh. "But you already know that." He nodded to the reports on her desk. "I guess now's when you ask if I think his death effected me. Probably. It was the first time I realized that there are no safety nets in life."

"Do you still believe that?"

"Sure. Don't you?" His gaze locked on hers and he knew she felt the weight of his words. Only the night before, she'd been telling him how hard it was now that Sarada had moved into her own apartment with her best friend. Just like she shouldn't have had to face motherhood alone, she shouldn't have had to face an empty nest alone either.

Sakura's lips turned up in a well-trained, very clinical smile as she said, "Well, this isn't about me, is it?"

Kakashi leaned his elbows on the desk, mirroring her. "Actually, it kind of is. I assure you, I would not have walked into this clinic if anyone else had asked me. The least you could do is make this less awkward by dropping the doctor/patient script."

There was that genuine, faint smile that reached up to her eyes. "Fine. I think there are safety nets if you set them up."

"Meaning?" He leaned back again, waiting.

"Meaning if something awful happened tomorrow, I know that my friends would be there for me. You ought to know that too. Naruto, Iruk, Genma, Anko, me... you've got a lot of people here who care about you. Those are all safety nets whether or not your biological family are in the picture."

That was the moment when Kakashi began to see Sakura as a woman. Of course, he'd known she was a woman. He'd watched her raise her daughter, after all, but that moment, that statement, was the moment he first looked at her as if she were no longer his student. But there was a difference between knowing something and knowing it. For months after that, he'd pushed back the growing attraction he had to her. Even if he didn't see her as a child any more, she was still a married woman, albeit an extremely attractive, caring, brilliant married woman.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Present Day...

There were few people on the streets of Konoha as Sakura made her way through the shadows. She was skillful enough that no eyes saw her, but it felt as if they somehow knew, as if her very aura screamed to the world, "I screwed my sensei two days after I buried my husband!"

How could I have been so stupid? she wondered as she finally made it to her own house, grateful to lock the door behind her, well aware that most people who may have cared to harm her had no respect for locks. Walking through the dark house, she went to her bathroom and stripped off her clothes, cursing herself for not having picked up her panties. They'd been tangled somewhere in the sheets, though, and leaving them was better than waking Kakashi.

Come to think of it, she thought as she stood naked in front of the mirror, he may not have really been sleeping.

But that was what women did when they picked up men in bars, wasn't it? They snuck off in the night so the morning wouldn't be awkward. Because it would have been awkward. She hung her head a little with a groan as she realized that everything was going to be awkward from then on out. She'd gotten used to Kakashi's presence at her house for supper when he'd come in from missions, the way he'd help with little things around the house that normally would have been considered Sasuke's job, him dropping in with breakfast at the clinic.

And I used him. What kind of awful person am I?

Who says you're awful?! her inner self shouted. Sasuke's been dead for a year and a half! You haven't laid eyes on him for more than two years! You're a grown ass woman! Women have needs too! It wasn't like you screwed someone like Iruka, who'd actually get attached! How many women have you personally seen Kakashi leave a bar with?! You probably did both of you a favor!

Sakura gave a resolute nod. That was right. It wasn't like she hadn't carefully considered it before she jumped in either.

She'd never been with another man besides Sasuke. Not one until that very night. And so far as she knew, Sasuke had never been with another woman either. They had taught each other everything they knew. She missed him in ways she didn't even fully understand, but he was gone. All she'd wanted was to hold him one more time, to feel his lips on hers.

Lady Tsunade had once pointed out how Kakashi was very much like Sasuke. At first Sakura'd laughed it off. Her goof-ball, perpetually late, porn-reading sensei was nothing like Sasuke. It wasn't until she became the director of the children's clinic and had started researching the effects of combat on child ninja that she finally understood. She remembered sitting there and reading his records. The unnamed mother who abandoned him, his remarkable childhood accomplishments, his father's suicide, Obito's death, Rin's death, Minato and Kushina's deaths... By the end of it there were tears streaming down her face. Even with all that loss, he'd been the youngest jounin ever and was considered by all to be a genius. Like Sasuke, it was noted that he was unable to form attachments.

That was when she started seeing the similarities. She remembered laughing to herself when she came to the conclusion that Kakashi was what Sasuke would have been if he'd have taken up porn and liquor instead of vengeance and honor. And in her mind, she'd tricked herself to think that sleeping with Kakashi wouldn't be so terribly different than sleeping with Sasuke. That it, somehow, would not feel like cheating.

But it did. Because although she'd gone into it thinking she'd just close her eyes and imagine it was Sasuke with her, she found herself wanting Kakashi. As he rode her, it wasn't some fantasy of her dead husband with her. It was Kakashi. And she'd wanted him.

Turning on the water, she wondered how exactly it was that something that had felt so incredibly right a few hours before could feel so incredibly wrong in that moment. She felt dirty. The thought that maybe, somewhere out there, Sasuke had seen what she'd just done felt worse than burying him had. Because never in all her years had she wanted to hurt Sasuke Uchiha, and her wanting Kakashi would have hurt Sasuke.

As she walked under the hot spray of the shower, the tears she'd been searching for for days suddenly hit her like a thunderstorm. She sat on the slick tiles, pulling her knees up under her chin as her body wracked with sobs. Why isn't Sasuke here? Why isn't here here, damn it!? All I ever wanted was him here with me! He's all I ever wanted!

Right up until that night.

She cried there until the hot water ran dwindled. Then she soaped herself down in cold water, moving through the motions robotically. Walking back out the shower, she glared down at the clothes on the top of the hamper. They were crumpled at the bottom of her trash can as she stormed off to sleep on the sofa.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi didn't sleep that night. He lay awake there for hours, the smell of her wrapped around him, before he got up, dressed, and made the bed. That was when he found her discarded panties. The fact that they reminded him so much of something a bride might wear had seemed sexy hours before, but there, in the harsh artificial light, it felt wrong. She'd just buried her husband, for fuck's sake! He was fourteen years her senior and, if his observations of her social habits were true, had a lot more experience in the field of one night stands than she did. As he stood there, looking at the still damp panties in his palm, he cursed himself for not having had the good sense to stop her. He wouldn't blame her if she hated him in the morning.

He hated him.

The women he normally brought home were like Anko, ones who, after they were finished would bound out of bed with a fox in the hen house grin and say something to the effect of, "Well, that was fun, Hatake. Next Thursday night work for you?" And then they would leave. It didn't hurt anyone because everyone knew what to expect going into it.

But somehow he'd managed to trick himself when she'd held him, stroking her silky hands over the scars on his back until he drifted off into one of the most peaceful sleeps he'd ever known. He remembered laying there in her arms thinking maybe, maybe she cared. Maybe she even loved him. Maybe she would stay.

And then what? a sinister voice in his mind asked. You'd set up house together and live like a nice, normal family? There isn't even grass growing on her husband's grave! For fuck's sake, what is wrong with you, you perverted, sick, worthless old man!

On his way out the bedroom, he tossed her panties into his hamper. There were three options, after all: 1) He could keep them, and if she found out she'd hate him even worse for it. 2) He could throw them away, and she'd assume he'd kept them and still hate him. OR 3) He could wash them and give them back to her and it would be awkward and she'd still probably wind up hating him.

Of them, the third felt like the best option.

He left his house and walked through the empty streets of Konoha. His feet knew the way to the graveyard better than they did his own house. It felt like each passing year the number of people he had there grew larger and the people he had in the living village grew smaller. That night he'd probably reduced the number of living people who gave a shit about him by at least one.

Stopping by the mound of fresh dirt, he closed his eyes, drawing a deep breath and waiting for Sasuke's ghost to reach out and kill him. But the minutes passed. No, it was never that easy. "I'm sorry," he whispered as he bent down and ran his fingers over the earth. "I'm going to make this right."

How he would do that evaded him for the moment, but he would. Her life would keep on as it always had, and he'd put away the stupid little fantasy he'd allowed himself to indulge in. She'd left. That was a good sign, he decided. It meant that that night had meant nothing to her. The next day things would start to go back to the way they'd always been, and he would never allow that to happen again.


	5. Chapter 5

The next morning, Sakura woke up from a deliciously beautiful dream that seemed just beyond her ability to remember. Sitting up, she stretched her arms above her head, popping her shoulders, when reality crashed around her. She had slept with Kakashi.

In the light of day, though, that decision didn't seem nearly as horrible as it had the night before. He'd had a string of lovers that would have easily stretched from one side of the Land of Fire to the other, and she had been a widow for well over a year. It didn't really matter that she had only just found out about it. Facts were facts, she thought as she padded to the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee.

She went in to work early that morning anxious to see how Chie was doing and perhaps to start untangling the truth of Sasuke's death. It wasn't until she was walking in the hospital and her stomach rumbled that she realized that she'd skipped breakfast out of habit. Every Sunday that he was in town, Kakashi brought her breakfast at the office. They would sit there for the half hour before her shift started and eat and talk.

There seemed to be little chance that that would happen, she thought, her mood darkening slightly as she turned towards the cafeteria. Somehow the prospect of dry bacon and a rock hard biscuit paled in comparison to the treats Kakashi brought. Ah well, you make your bed, you lie in it, her inner self reminded her as she was on her way back to her office again.

But as she rounded the corner, there was Kakashi, leaned up against the wall beside her door, a bag of food dangling from his fingertips. "Yo," he said with an eye-crinkling smile that barely faltered as he noticed the paper bag in her hand.

She followed his gaze. "I didn't think you'd be here."

"Want me to leave?"

God, Sakura, you're making this awkward! Just act normal! her inner voice screamed.

She scoffed. "No. I'm just a little surprised, is all." The slight hitch in his breathing when she walked closer to unlock the door caught her attention. Maybe he's nervous too, she thought, but her inner voice quickly shot that down. This is Kakashi Hatake we're talking about! He probably can't even remember who he had sex with last week. You have as much chance of making him nervous as Choji does of becoming a male model. Actually, considering what he looked like when he expended most of his chakra, that was probably more plausible...

He sniffed. "So am I to take it that you didn't buy enough hospital bacon and dog biscuits for both of us?"

Holding the bag out to him she asked, "You think Pakkun would want it?"

Kakashi cocked his head to the side as he stared at the slightly greasy brown paper bag. "I don't even think Naruto would like it. Throw that away, please. Preferably in the hallway."

She couldn't help a chuckle as she went out and did as he asked. By the time she got back, he'd started to lay out their breakfast on the coffee table near her sofa. There was pancakes, fruit, and sausage along with a thermos of coffee. "Wow, that looks amazing," she said as she sat down and picked up a plate. "One day, you'll need to teach me how to cook good pancakes. Remember how Sarada used to insist that you were the only one allowed to touch the box of mix in our house."

He chuckled as he poured syrup over his own pancakes. "Well, that was until I taught her how to make them herself."

"I'm sure ChoCho appreciates your tutelage."

It was as if the night before hadn't happened. Every fear Sakura had the night before was wiped away as they made small talk about cooking, which naturally led to a debate about whether or not toast counted as cooking. Kakashi said no. Sakura said yes. It was a comfortingly familiar argument they'd had at least a dozen times before. When her phone rang, she looked up at the clock on the wall, shocked that an hour had passed. "Director Uchiha," she said, trying to focus all of her attention on the medic who was asking her about a boy in the rehab ward.

When she hung up, she went back to Kakashi. "You have to go," he said as he started to pick up their meal.

"I'm sorry. I lost track of time."

"Me too," he said. Digging in his pocket he drew out a small square of fabric and handed it to her. She could feel the blush rise to her cheeks as she realized it was her panties, cleaned and folded. "Figured you probably wanted those back."

"Thanks," she mumbled as she stuffed them into the pocket of her coat.

There were hundreds of things she wanted to say, to ask, but he'd already turned back to the task at hand. When he'd put the last thing back inside his bag, he grinned at her. "Have a good day, Sakura," he said as he walked towards the door.

"I'm sorry about last night!" she blurted out. As soon as the words left her mouth she felt the horror of them and her face burned.

He paused with his hand on the door knob. "I figured you would be." Looking at her over his shoulder with that fake smile he said, "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone." And then he was gone.

"That wasn't what I meant," she said after the door closed. Maybe he heard her, maybe he didn't. It didn't matter. If shame would have killed, she'd have died right there on her office floor. The worst part was that she couldn't go after him, not right then. The things she needed to tell him would take hours, not minutes, and people were waiting for her.

OoO*OoO*OoO

When she got off work, she stopped by The Broken Cup to see if Kakashi was there, but he wasn't. She walked to his house, but it didn't appear that he was there either. Maybe he got a new mission, she thought. Or maybe he's just at some woman's house. She gave a single, half-hearted chuckle as she turned down the street to her house. Then she saw him, sitting on her front step. When she got close he said, "We need to talk," in the same friendly tone he'd taken while teaching them particularly tedious things when they were children.

"I'm sorry about what I said earlier."

"First, stop apologizing," he said as he opened the door to let her in. He walked in slowly and leaned against the breakfast bar, watching as she stood in the middle of the living room, waiting. "Did you enjoy yourself?"

"Well, yeah, but that's hardly the point..."

He held up his forefinger. "No, that's exactly the point. See, I enjoyed myself; you enjoyed yourself. Stop moralizing it. It was fun. It's over. No harm done to anyone."

"But I used you." She bit the inside of her lip.

He shrugged. "I'm a big boy. I could have stopped you if I'd have wanted to."

"I'm..." she was about to say "sorry," but caught herself. "Just very... not used to this... kind of stuff."

"Casual sex? Yeah, I got that. You're very good at it, though. Fast learner."

She rolled her eyes. He would be making jokes now while she was trying to be serious and sort everything out. "Are you mad at me?"

"For a night of incredible sex? No, no I'm not mad at you."

"And this doesn't change anything between us?"

She caught a flicker of something in his eyes, but he barely paused as he said, "Not unless you want it to."

Comfort washed over her. Maybe nothing would change. The closeness they'd enjoyed would continue and in time the awkwardness would fall away. Who knew, maybe one day, years from that moment, they would laugh about it. Something she'd read years back came to her. "We were just taking what small comforts we could, I guess."

"You could say that," he said. "Naruto finally gave me a break, so I think I'll go to the Red Lotus for the week. Just in case you need anything."

She chuckled. Kakashi and bath houses. "I'm not going to bother you while you're relaxing," she said as she moved to the kitchen and took out a bottle of sake. "Thirsty?"

"I thought you'd never ask," he said as took the cup she offered him. "Kanpai!"

"Kanpai!" she repeated as she took a sip along with him.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi walked home alone, his heart somewhere between breaking and mending. Sakura was happy. That was what mattered in the end. They'd talked a bit about Sasuke. Twenty years ago, he would have expected her to be beside herself with grief. Ten years ago, he would have expected her to be in mourning. But after twenty-five years of her watching Sasuke distance himself from her, Kakashi could understand the fact that she found it hard to hurt the way she thought she ought to.

He opened the door to his house, standing in the darkened doorway. The silence seemed crushing. Not for the first time he kicked himself for ever having moved from his apartment. The single room had always been more than enough. Its thin walls meant he always heard everyone around him. When his dad had killed himself, Kakashi had quickly learned that Konoha's Orphan Fund would not cover the modest house they'd been living in, but the noise of the apartment was welcome compared to the tomblike house he'd shared with his father.

The irony was that he'd bought this new house for himself as a gift for his forty-fifth birthday. He'd managed to save quite a bit of money over the last decades and so he'd splurged on a house with a big kitchen and a large garden in the back. It was way more space that he either needed or knew what to do with. Sakura was the first person who'd seen it. She'd walked through the rooms, whistling occasionally. "Well, the good thing is that if the rest of Konoha suddenly becomes homeless, we can all crash at your house," she teased as she rocked back on her heels, chuckling at her own joke. She'd helped him move in and decorate.

He'd gotten used to having both her and Sarada at his house, and when Sasuke showed up eight months after he'd moved in, their absence was painful. It was before Kakashi even realized that he was attracted to Sakura. Or maybe, he mused as he stood there looking at the empty room, the things he'd felt for her in those days were the truest attraction she held for him. She was there. Unlike the women who shared his bed, Sakura had shared his home, his heart. She knew the anniversaries of the deaths of all those dear to him, and she knew him well enough to tell in a moment if he wanted her to stay or leave him on those days. He would always cook for them, but she would clean up, hiding thank you notes in his refrigerator or cabinets. She was the one who'd planted the flowers out front.

Closing the front door, he walked to his bedroom. It still smelled like her, like her lilac soap and pheromones. When he got out the shower, he debated whether or not to change the sheets and decided against it. He plucked Icha Icha Paradise from his bookshelf and lay down. Contrary to what many in the village probably thought, he didn't read the books for the sex scenes. They were okay, but what really appealed to him were the things that proceeded and followed them. The words flowed out, creating languid images in his imagination of what it must be like for lovers to open their hearts and souls to each other, to bask in each other's presence.

While most men he knew considered romance a necessary evil to get sex, he was quite the opposite. Sex was a tool to earn a few hours with another person, maybe to hear her, in a moment of blissful abandon, breathe the words, "I love you," even if she didn't mean them. It seemed the older he got, the more he realized how much he'd screwed up his chances of ever having the kind of romance he read about. But those were just fairy tales, he knew as he closed the book and set it on his nightstand.

The next morning, he'd wash the sheets and head to the bathhouse. Sakura was going to be fine. Things would fall back into their old order.


	6. Chapter 6

The week that passed was frustrating for Sakura. Chie had not spoken at all since the first day Sakura had met her, and worse yet, she was beginning to refuse to eat. "Chie," Sakura said as she sat on the floor opposite the girl with a bowl of fruit between them. "Don't you want to try one of these strawberries." She held out one of red fruit towards the girl. "They're yummy." And to prove it, she popped on in her mouth, doing a little dance as she smiled. "Yum!"

Chie reached her hand out, but instead of picking up a piece of fruit, she traced her fingers around the pattern on the outside of the metal bowl. Maybe that would work, Sakura thought as she scooted away slightly before she slowly got up and walked out to the hallway, coming back with a pad of blank paper and a box of crayons.

The little girl barely met Sakura's gaze as the woman sat back in front of her. "Chie, I know you don't want to talk right now. I understand that. It's okay, but we do need to know some things so that we can help you." Sakura pulled a blue color out of the box, and started to draw a flower. Chie's eyes grew wide and she backed up slowly. "It's okay, it's okay, it's just coloring," Sakura said as she offered the color to Chie. "Do you want to draw..?"

At that word, Chie screamed, quickly crawling back to her favorite corner as she clutched onto Sasuke's cloak like a talisman. "No! No draw! No draw! Monsters! Monsters come! No!"

Another puzzle piece fell into place. Sakura quickly pulled the sheet with the flower off of the pad and crumbled it into a ball. "It's okay," she said gently. "No drawing. Okay?" She tucked the ball of paper in her pocket. "No monsters."

Chie eyed her suspiciously.

"Did someone draw the monsters that killed Sasuke?"

The little girl bit her lip, but gave a small nod.

"Do you know who drew the monsters?"

Another pause and another nod.

"Do you think you could tell me who that was?"

She shook her head.

"That's okay," Sakura said as she pushed the pad and crayons away. "But you know, Fire Eyes would want you to eat. He would want you to be strong. Right?"

Chia pulled the cloak around her a bit tighter, but she gave a reluctant nod and crawled towards the bowl, picking up a pear before she crawled back. Her deep brown eyes didn't leave Sakura as she bit into it.

"Good girl," Sakura said. She stayed there until Chie had finished the piece of fruit. "I'm going to leave these here," she said. "I have to go, but Dr. Lin will be here if you need anything. I'll see you in the morning."

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura felt guilty as she made her way to Ino's shop that evening just before her friend closed up. This is to help Chie, she kept telling herself, but the truth was that as important as helping Chie was to her, it was also about finding out what happened to Sasuke. For that, she was very sorry.

"Hey, Billboard Brow," Ino said cheerily as the bells chimed.

"Hey, Ino," Sakura said.

Ino's shoulders feel. "Oh no. Something awful happened didn't it?"

Sakura braced her nerves. "No, not really, but I have a favor to ask you."

"Okay," Ino drew out the word as she took off her apron and began to fold it.

"The little girl that was found near where Sasuke was buried is afraid of drawing." She saw Ino flinch, and knew the reason for it. "I would have asked Kakashi or Yamato, but I know Sai had started to record things about his time in Root and seeing as that was his particular type of jutsu, I thought..."

"That it may be a bit more productive," Ino finished her thought with a tight smile. "I'd love to help. Just let me lock up."

They didn't talk as they walked towards Ino and Sai's house. The women walked all the way through the silent house until Ino got to a back room and she drew a key from her pocket. "I really don't know exactly where those journals are," Ino said apologetically as she pushed open the door. There was only the thinnest light coming through a window, and when Ino flipped on the light switch, she drew a sharp breath.

"I'm so sorry about this," Sakura said as she glanced at her friend apologetically.

Tears welled up in Ino's eyes, but she shook her head. "I really don't know why I didn't go through all these things before. I just... I'm sorry. I must seem silly to you. I've watched you be so brave here I am five years later still dripping like a sponge."

"You loved Sai," Sakura said as she reached out and took Ino's hand in hers.

"I really, really did," Ino said as two fat tears rolled down her cheeks. She brushed them away with a sheepish chuckle. "Oh, god, let me go make us some tea. Jasmine?" When Sakura nodded, Ino took a step back towards the door, reluctantly letting Sakura's hand drop. "Call me if you need anything, but you're welcome to go through whatever you want," she added with a wave of her hand around to indicate that everything was fair game. Sakura couldn't help but feel that it really wasn't.

The worst thing was that Sakura was actually jealous of her friend. What must it be to have such a connection to the love of your life that even walking into his studio five years after his death brought tears? It had taken almost six months after the funeral for Ino to even leave the house. Then some time, about three years ago, it was as if a switch flipped. Ino was back to her old self, or so it seemed. She went out to bars. She picked up guys. She took dangerous missions whenever they came up. Everything was the same, except on the 23rd of May or whenever someone mentioned Sai's name.

Sakura felt like a tomb robber, taking the dusty journals off his bookshelf with reverence. She sat at his desk, carefully flipping through the pages as she looked for any evidence that Danzo had other artistic ninja in Root. Three books were stacked in the pile by the time Ino came back, red-eyed, but more collected with two steaming cups of tea. "One spoon of honey, right?"

"Yes, thank you," Sakura said with a smile as she took the cup. "He has an amazing amount of information here."

Ino's smile wasn't quite as pained as it had been before. "He was always very thorough," she said with a small chuckle.

"You know, they may help Kakashi and Naruto tie up some of the loose ends."

The blonde haired woman nodded as she looked around the room. "Inojin keeps telling me that. I just... I'm not sure how to let go of all these things. When I come in here, it just... it feels like he's going to walk right back through that door. You know what I mean?"

"Yeah. I feel like any day now Sasuke will come home, but there's no place in the house that really feels like his."

Ino walked up behind Sakura and put her arms around the girl's shoulders and leaned her head against her own arm. "We're a right set, aren't we, Forehead?"

"I'd say we ought to move in together, but I'm not sure I could stomach it, Ino Pig," Sakura said, leaning her head up against her friend's.

Ino squeezed Sakura a bit tighter as she burst out laughing, and Sakura found herself joining in. When Sakura left Ino's house hours later, with a journal tucked under her arms, she felt like maybe the two of them had actually helped each other. The next day she would ask Naruto's permission to go to the woods and investigate. She didn't have any doubts that he'd give his permission, and she was past due for a vacation from the clinic.

"We're going to figure this all out, Fire Eyes," she whispered as she looked up at the moon. It felt like he was smiling down at her.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi walked through the darkened streets of Konoha with his hands in his pockets softly whistling to himself. His duffle bag gently swayed as he walked. That week away had been just what he'd needed to clear his mind. He considered stopping in to The Broken Cup as he passed it. It wouldn't be the worst thing in the world if he'd take someone home, but as he turned down the street that led to it, he spotted a pink haired woman walking towards him with a book tucked under her arm.

And everything he'd managed to not think about that week seemed to erupt in his mind like a volcano, especially when she spotted him and she gave him the most beautiful smile as she quickened her pace. She'd asked if sex changed anything between them and had seemed relieved when he'd told her it didn't have to. Everything had to stay the same. He reminded himself of that again as she stopped in front of him. "Hey," he said.

"Hey, how was your break?"

"Peaceful. How's your week been?"

"I think I may be on to something." She filled him in on the things that had happened as she opened the book, scanning through the pages until she put her finger on the place she wanted him read. "So, see, Sai wrote about Danzo training at least a dozen ninja in artistic jutsu, and at least three of them went rogue."

"Hmm."

"Hmm? Is that all!? Maybe it was one of these rogues that killed Sasuke!"

"And maybe it wasn't," Kakashi said blandly. "Root hasn't been active for quite some time. Most of them are probably dead."

The faint smile she'd been wearing faltered. "Maybe," she said as she closed the book and put it back under her arms.

She was mad at him, but it didn't really matter. Sakura had become more adjusted to life behind a desk that life out in the field, and he didn't like the gleam in her eyes that said she was going to go after these people herself. He'd seen that same look several times before. Distraction may help, "I was about to stop in to The Broken Cup; you want a drink?"

There was barely a pause before she said, "Nah, you go on and have fun. I'll see you around."

"Have a good night," he said as she started walking off.

"Yeah, you too," she called over her shoulder.

He watched her for a minute; she wouldn't leave that night. When she was younger, she would have, but now she would tie up all her loose ends first. That gave him about three days. As he walked into The Broken Cup, he started plotting out how he'd manage to keep her safe this time.

Ten minutes after he'd sat down at the bar, Anko walked up behind him and put her arms around his shoulders. "Hey there, Hatake," she purred, "long time no see." Looking up, she called to the bartender, "Give us six shots whiskey, Sam."

"My name's Genta," the bartender huffed.

"Details, details," Anko sing-songed as she sat down beside Kakashi, her arm still draped over his shoulder. "So, where have you been?"

"Bathhouse," Kakashi said just before he plucked on of the shots the bartender brought and downed it.

"Hmm, that must be why you smell delicious," she said as she leaned in again and drew her tongue up the side of his neck, stopping at his ear to whisper, "I could eat you up."

He gave a chuckle he didn't really feel. Anko was, perhaps, the closest thing Kakashi had ever had to a girlfriend. When she'd first come back to the village after leaving Orochimaru, she'd been an outcast. He was serving on ANBU, and the whole village cutting him a wide berth with whispers of "friend-killer." And they weren't scared of each other.

When he'd been 28 and she'd been 29, after they'd been fucking for ten years whenever the mood struck, he'd asked her out on a real date. She'd laughed in his face. "What are you, high?!" she'd asked. "Why the hell screw up a good thing? Were you going to show up with, like, flowers and everything?" At that she'd laughed even harder, because that was Anko.

He drained the third shot.

Anko finished hers as well, her eyes studying him. "Someone die?"

Turning slowly to her, he drawled, "Not today as far as I know."

She reached over and ran her hand up the inside of his leg before grabbing his cock through his pants. "Come to the back with me."

"Not tonight."

Her eyebrow raised, but she just shrugged, standing up as she drew a long breath. "Suit yourself. Your loss is someone else's gain." And then she prowled off with the same catlike agility and complete lack of discretion she'd always had.

Sakura's words echoed in his mind, "Nah, you go on and have fun." He knew what she'd been thinking. It was tempting to go to her house and inform her that he was going home alone. Even pushing fifty there were some things that men don't outgrow, trying to pass themselves off as more noble than they really were high among them.

Instead he just went back to his empty house and his bed with its freshly laundered sheets.

A week away from her wasn't enough.


	7. Chapter 7

"Be reasonable," were not words Sakura was used to hearing come out of Naruto's mouth, but there she was, hearing them.

"I am being reasonable; let me go and check things out. If you want, I'll take a couple of ANBU with me."

The blond-haired man's eyes narrowed slightly as he cocked his head to the side and studied his former teammate. "What happened between you and Kakashi-sensei?"

Sakura was fairly proud of herself for being able to fight back the blush that threatened to rise. "Nothing! But in case you didn't notice, he's getting rather old and as you pointed out several times, this is a very dangerous mission."

Naruto rubbed his chin. "Well, you kind of have a point there about his age. Maybe I ought to send someone else with you. I could always assign Kakashi to keep an eye on Orochimaru and send you with Yamato."

"Or, you could just sent me with a couple black ops and I'll be fine."

Naruto drew a deep breath as he leaned against his desk. "Sasuke wasn't fine, and we don't really know what you'll be up against. I'd rather you have someone there who knows about Root. In the village that leaves Orochimaru, who I don't trust, Yamato, and Kakashi, and seeing as Kakashi already volunteered..."

Sakura almost choked, but caught herself. "When did he talk to you about that?"

"About an hour or so before you got here," Naruto said in an offhanded sort of way as he rifled through some papers on his desk. "I mean, I thought the two of you had planned it out." He handed a request written in Kakashi's handwriting for an ANBU escort for two weeks.

"We... talked about it in passing," Sakura said as she looked down at the paper in disbelief, "but it didn't sound like he really wanted to go."

"Well, he was pretty determined this morning."

So determined, apparently, that he'd gone to the Hokage behind her back while she was trying to schedule time off from the hospital. She didn't betray her feelings, though. "Well, I guess if he'd willing, I'll stick with him."

"Great," Naruto said with a beaming smile. "I'll arrange everything on my end, and you two get prepared to leave in the next couple days or so."

She wondered if her friend had any idea how much anger was seething under the surface as she left his office. Kakashi had essentially blown her off the night before as if drinking in some dive bar were as important as solving her husband's murder. Now he had the audacity to want to put himself in the middle of it. How dare he?!

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sometimes, the most annoying thing about ninjas, even to other ninjas, is the fact that when you are looking for them, they are never where you expect them to be. With each stop she made in her search for Kakashi her aggravation grew, until she finally gave up and headed towards practice area 3. He, she decided, as not worth wasting an entire day playing cat and mouse.

There were so many memories on that field, both good and bad. Mostly good, though, she thought as she stood in the shade of the trees watching Sarada working with her three man squad. This particular group was a bit of an oddity as it had two kunoichi, a set of twin girls who were able to merge themselves together to form a monstrous being. The only boy was a mousy looking kid from the Inuzuka clan. She'd grown up knowing Kiba, who was always a bit of a loud-mouth and never much of a thinker, but this boy had almost as much cunning Shikamaru and a quiet nature that almost rivaled Hinata. The set balanced each other well.

When they broke for lunch, Sarada walked back into the shadows. "How do they look?" she asked with a contented smile.

"Like they're a solid team," Sakura said honestly. "You're a great teacher."

Sarada chuckled, blushing slightly. "Well, I had some of the best teachers growing up, even before the academy. Remember when you and Kakashi would bring me down here when I was little?"

Her words, so innocent, threw water on the anger that had been burning not a half hour before. Out of the smoke, Sakura saw images of all those moments when he was there for them. Maybe that's what he thinks he's still doing, she mused, being there for me. She pursed her lips as she nodded. "You were the cutest kid ever. Look, I actually wanted to invite you to lunch today; I wanted to talk about a mission I'll be going on soon."

"It's about Dad, isn't it?" Sarada asked.

"Yes, it is."

The dark-haired woman nodded. "I was wondering how long it would take."

"For what?"

"For you to go after him. Hokage-sama said you always used to go after him, up until I was born."

"Well, I didn't have to chase him after that. I knew he'd come back because he loved you so much. You brought a lot of stability into both of our lives."

Sarada gave a single chuckle. "No matter how much I love him, you have to really stretch the idea of stability for Dad to fall under its umbrella." A breeze picked up, and Sarada pointed out at the leaves, twirling as they cascaded towards the forest floor. "That was Dad, always driven by something I couldn't see or really completely understand."

"But he did love you," Sakura reminded her.

"Yeah, I know he did," her daughter said with a soft smile as she continued to watch the leaves for a moment more. "Barbeque?"

They chatted as they walked about the upcoming chunnin exams and the possibility of her team passing. "I'm not really sure how I feel about it," Sarada confided in her mother. "On one hand, they're very capable, but on the other, I don't know, it's terrifying that they'll be out there doing real missions. Things can turn so quickly."

Sakura thought of her own teams first real mission with the bridge-builder. Although things seemed more peaceful now, there was still danger lurking. A part of her wished that they could do away with training children for war; she'd studied cultures that reverenced childhood to the point that it was unthinkable to give a child a weapon, much less train them to kill with it. She also knew that there were life-saving skills, like making clones or body flickering, that had to be learned as a child to be properly mastered. It was Sarada's job to make sure these children survived whatever was out there, because no amount of Sakura's wishful thinking would stop war from coming to Konoha again.

They were sitting across the table from each other talking about Chie when Kakashi walked into the resturant. Sakura's eyes narrowed as she spotted him, but rather than take the hint, he walked up to them. "Fancy seeing both of you here," he said as he plopped onto the seat beside Sarada.

"We were in the middle of discussing our upcoming mission," Sakura said with a pointed glare at the silver-haired man.

"Oh, you're going with her?" Sarada asked, relief heavier than Sakura appreciated on her voice.

"Naruto thought it was best," he said offhandedly as he reached for a menu and started to peruse it.

"After you suggested it," Sakura muttered.

"I'm sorry, what was that?" he asked with that obnoxious smile.

She didn't repeat herself. "I'm sure you've got a lot of planning to do. Things to get in place before we leave."

"Not really."

"Oh, you ought to try the new dumplings," Sarada said as she pointed to the item on the menu. "If I didn't watch myself, I'd eat a dozen of them."

By the time that they'd finished lunch and Sarada parted ways with them, the anger that Sarada's memories had quenched was a roaring fire again. "Are you completely incapable of taking a hint?!" she growled at Kakashi as soon as Sarada was out of earshot.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Kakashi said as he put his hands in his pockets and started down the street.

"I wanted to have a nice, quiet lunch with my daughter so that I could explain the mission to her."

"Wasn't that what happened?"

"I didn't want you there, Kakashi."

There was a brief look of something akin to fear in his eyes, but as quickly as Sakura spotted it, it was gone. He shrugged. "You should have said something."

"With any normal person I wouldn't have to," she grumbled. "Why did you ask Naruto to go along with me?"

"Believe it or not, you are not the only person who cares about finding out how Sasuke died. Regardless, my decision has more to do with Sarada than it does you."

"What does Sarada have to do with you going!?"

"She just lost her father, she shouldn't lose her mother too." His voice was flat as if he were discussing the weather with a fellow passenger on a train rather than giving counter-arguments to a woman was screaming at him.

Sakura clenched her teeth to keep from yelling again. He didn't think she still had enough skill to keep herself alive?! She'd show him! Maybe she'd even take Naruto on his offer to send Yamato instead of him. She didn't speak to him again until they turned down her road. "Did you need anything? Because I have to pack."

"I was just enjoying your company." There was that infuriating smile again.

She rolled her eyes. "Sure you were. I'll see you later, Kakashi."

"Do you still have that black wig?" he asked as she was halfway down the walkway.

"Yes."

"I thought it would be best for us to go undercover," he said cheerily. "Anyway, just a thought. Have a good afternoon." And then he turned and strolled down the street, humming to himself.

OoO*OoO*OoO

When Kakashi got back home, he tossed his bag onto the bed. His gaze caught the picture of Team 7 that stood on his windowsill. Some days it was hard to imagine Hospital Director Sakura Uchiha was still the same person as that smiling girl. She'd been less reckless than Naruto, but that didn't say much. It seemed Sasuke's death had brought out some of that old impulsive nature in her.

If he hadn't gone to talk to Naruto, she would probably would have tried to get approval to go alone. To hell with all the consequences. He scowled down at the stack of clothes he'd just taken out of his drawer. It was one thing for her not to care about what her death would do to him. No one had ever cared about that. It was quite another for her to disregard what it would do to Sarada. She was the closest thing he had to a child of his own. He'd been there for her first day at the Academy and seen her earn her flak jacket. When she'd had her first heartbreak it had been him that had sympathized with her that all boys were indeed idiots and then had taken her out for ice cream.

Sakura being mad at him didn't really phase him. She'd been mad at him at least a thousand times over the years. He only hoped that she'd forgive him before Naruto finished finalizing their mission. She would need to have her head on straight whenever they faced whatever it was they were chasing.


	8. Chapter 8

Sakura woke with a start just after midnight. It wasn't the first time she'd had that nightmare, the one where Sasuke used genjutsu to reach into her chest and grab her heart. It felt like she'd died right there, her heart stopped under his grip only to slowly sputter back to life. She could hear Kakashi and Sasuke talking, but to that day, she could not recall a thing they said as she'd lay there barely breathing, every fiber of her being in pain.

No sense laying around thinking about that, she thought as she pushed herself up off the sofa and popped her back. Instead she went back to their bedroom and started to pack. Without thinking about it, she went to the chest that held their weapons and her breath caught in her throat. Of course. Of all the places in their home, this was the one place that reminded her of Sasuke. She kept a handful of shuriken and her favorite three kunai in the nightstand beside her dresser, but everything inside that chest was oiled and laid out in the meticulous fashion by her husband. Her fingertips trembled as she barely skimmed them over the cold metal. Her vision began to swim.

The thing about that nightmare was that she knew, if she'd have had to, she'd have let him kill her for real so that eventually he could have been saved. Her life meant nothing to her then and it barely meant anything more to her in that moment, sobbing on the floor beside his weapons. Kakashi's words about Sarada losing both her parents echoed in her mind. He was right. A miserable sob wracked her body as she futilely tried to wipe away the tears with the backs of her hands.

She shut the chest harder than she should have, and she was sure she'd thrown some of the pieces out of their positions. It didn't matter, though, as she walked to the nightstand and took a sleeping pill. It would take at least an hour to take full effect and rather than lay on the sofa staring into the darkness, she pulled on a cloak and slid her sandals on as she went out into the cool night air. She'd meant to go to the graveyard, but she found herself walking aimlessly for a half hour before she made her way to Kakashi's street.

Her fist had already rapped on the door before she realized that it was past midnight and she sheepishly hurried back down the walk. She froze, mid-step, when the door opened. "Sakura?" Kakashi's sleep-heavy voice asked.

Turning, she walked back to him, her gaze not meeting his. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you." Her mind was already starting to swim from the medication.

"You've been crying. Come in."

"Is there anyone else here?"

"No," he said and gently put his hand on her shoulder, ushering her into the dark foyer and then into the living room. He guided her as if she were a blind woman, slowly lowering her onto the sofa. "What happened?"

"It's so stupid," she said, trying to laugh it off and failing miserably as the tears welled up again. She pushed them aside. Maybe it would help to tell him. "Remember the time Sasuke put the genjutsu on me? I had a nightmare about that, and then I went to pack and I went into our weapons' chest and," she drew a deep breath, "you were right. I was running into this because I wanted to die. I didn't even realize it. That makes me crazy, doesn't it?"

His jaw flexed under the mask, but he didn't say anything as he reached out and put his arms around her. She rested her head on his shoulder as the tears fell like rain. It felt like she melted into him, all the tension, anger, and sorrow dropping away as a gentle warmth spread over her and sleep took her.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Lightening consumed his vision, but as it dissipated, it wasn't Rin Nohara's face in front of him. It was Sakura's.

He woke with a gasp. Sakura stirred on his chest. "I'm sorry," she mumbled, rubbing her eyes as she started to sit up. "I didn't mean to fall asleep on you."

Panic washed over him. She couldn't leave. Not then.

Reaching out, he put his hand on the side of her head, gently pulling her back towards him, and she didn't make any argument. "Please stay," he said as he lay back down on the wide sofa, cradling her against his chest. She was back asleep in a minute, but he lay there, awake, fighting against the memories and nightmares that threatened to consume him.

How many years had it been since he'd woken in terror? A decade, maybe, but her words about wanting to die had struck him harder than he'd expected. He'd thought he knew it, but somehow hearing those words roll off of her lips made them so much more real.

The genjutsu may have scared Sakura, but it was the chidori that Sasuke had almost killed her with that haunted Kakashi's dreams. If he'd been a split second later, he would have had to bury her. Again, the thought came unbidden into his mind. It was almost impossible to miss the similarities between Sakura and Rin. Of course, that could have just been fate being cruel, because as much as Sakura reminded him of Rin, Sasuke reminded him of himself. He had to watch that idiot genius do his best to destroy the woman who loved him for years, but he could not watch that boy kill her again.

He pressed his lips against the top of her hair, drinking in her scent as he tried to steady his breathing. Tears stung his eyes. He couldn't let her kill herself. Not again. Somehow he would save her.

The insanity of that moment wasn't lost on him as his eyes began to grow heavy again. That afternoon she'd been furious with him, then she'd shown up on his doorstep crying over her desire to rejoin her dead husband, and that was how he found himself falling asleep with the first woman who may wake in his arms in the dawn. The gods were probably laughing at him.

Let them! Defiance coursed through his sleep-addled brain. I'll take an eternity in hell being the butt of all their jokes if she'll just survive.

OoO*OoO*OoO

He woke before she did. The orange rays of the sunrise tinted her hair rose gold and it took almost all his restraint not to run his fingers through it. Her breath was coming out in soft puffs, and her fingers clutched his shirt. If he could have captured that moment and held it forever, he would have.

It's not like she came here out of love for you, a sinister voice inside his head reminded him.

That didn't matter, though, he knew as he leaned down and kissed the top of her hair again.

She stirred.

Damn it.

But she didn't panic. Instead she squirmed slightly like a kitten that had just been roused. Her sleep heavy eyes looked up at him and she grinned sheepishly before she turned away with a contented sigh and lay her head back down on his chest. "I always tell my patients not to go out when they take sleep meds; seems like I should take my own advice."

He gave a nervous chuckle. His mind was going a thousand miles an hour. Where should I put my hands? Do not get a hard on! I ought to make her breakfast. She's got awful morning breath; should I offer her a toothbrush or will that insult her?

"I'm sorry about waking you up last night over a stupid nightmare."

Now you're supposed to say something back, you idiot! He felt a fierce blush rise on his cheeks and he fought against it. "I-i-it..." He clamped his mouth shut. Damn it all.

She looked up at him with an amused smirk that he knew all too well, but she didn't laugh.

He drew as deep a breath as he felt safe and tried again. "It wasn't stupid." Better.

The warmth that left him when she sat up was almost painful, but then she stretched, her hands reaching high over her head, revealing a hint of her taut abdomen. That combined with her messy hair and her lack of make-up was the thing his fantasies were made of.

"You make a very comfortable bed," she said as she got up and walked towards the door. He would have bet his last dollar that she hadn't meant it to be suggestive. It was in the same friendly tone that she usually had. "Want me to go make coffee?"

He nodded and she disappeared towards the kitchen.

What just happened? he asked himself as he sat up, scratching the back of his hair as he stretched. He got up and walked to the doorway to the kitchen, leaning against the frame as he watched her move around the room as if she owned it. In a way, she did. That was what made all of this so precarious. He was letting himself believe that this momentary blip in their friendship was somehow something more than that.

He remembered the first girl he'd ever asked out. He'd been twenty-one, still in ANBU. Her name had been Mi, and she'd been a medic at the hospital. She was sweet and quiet; not like most of the women who approached him in bars. The day of his discharge, he worked up the nerve to talk to her. "I w-was... wondering if you'd like to go out some time."

She shifted her weigh as she bit the inside of her lip. "That's sweet, it really is, but I'm not your type of woman."

It felt like his heart dropped six inches. He gave a nervous chuckle. "Well, you... I mean, I... I'm a better judge of who's my type. Right?"

Her expression grew slightly exasperated. "I'm not the type of woman who sleeps with a guy on the first date." She started to walk down the hallway.

"Great!" he said a bit too quickly as he followed along side her. "I mean, I like that in a woman. It's refreshing."

She stopped, and put a hand on her hip. "I do not want to date you, Mr. Hatake. What part of that are you finding it hard to understand?"

"I-I... I don't know."

"God, you're an idiot. Look, if you're really want someone to hook up with tonight, ask Sachiko; she'll sleep with anyone." And then she'd walked away and left him there, feeling like the biggest jerk in the world when all he'd wanted to do was take her out for dinner and dancing.

"Earth to Kakashi," Sakura sing-songed as she walked up to him.

"I'm sorry, what was that?"

"I said, you need to make breakfast if you don't want to eat cereal and milk, but I've got to admit, I make a mean bowl of cereal and milk."

"I'll cook."

"Perfect," she said with a broad smile as she walked around him, still talking as she went down the hall. "I'm going to get cleaned up. I'll be back in a few."

That was the moment that he realized that being with Sakura was like breathing. The only problem was, he wasn't sure how long she would stay and it was impossible to live without air.


	9. Chapter 9

Four days later, they were camped in a forest in the Land of Water. Sakura was starting the fire, and Kakashi was in the distance talking with their ANBU escorts. "Do you ever miss being part of that?" she asked with a nod towards the two black ops who'd just disappeared into the trees.

"Sometimes," he said as he sat opposite her and grabbed a fish from out of a crude trap. "Y-you miss going on missions?"

"Sometimes," she repeated with a smile in his direction as she put the last of the logs onto it. "That ought to get you started."

When he appeared at her door the morning they left, with his moppish brown wig and purple eye make-up, sans mask, Sakura's jaw had fallen. "Oh my... You're Sukea!"

"One and the same," Kakashi said with a bow.

"You're incorrigible." She rolled her eyes, then twirled around, letting the short tent dress she was wearing over a set of short tights spin around her like a blooming flower. "Do I look flaky enough to be a photographer's wife?" To complete the effect she bobbed her head from side to side, making the dark wig bounce.

"Definitely a flake," he said with a slight chuckle, but she noticed a faint blush that had risen on his cheeks.

She propped her chin on the heel of her hand as she watched Kakashi gut the fish and set it to cook over the fire. Ever since the morning after she'd wound up at his house following the nightmare, she'd noticed that he blushed often, sometimes stuttering over his words. It didn't make sense. Kakashi was one of Konoha's most notorious playboys. She'd watched him face down deadly enemies without flinching. He'd had sex with her and essentially written it off as a non-event, for goodness sake! There was a mystery to why he was, all of a sudden, acting like a love-struck school boy.

Shaking her head, she stood up. "I'm going to go gather up some more fire wood," she said.

He nodded. "Don't go any further than the perimeter I showed you earlier."

ANBU had set up the perimeter, around which they would be patrolling. Sakura scanned the woods for them, but couldn't even pick up the hint of their chakra. Well, she thought, they are the best of the best.

She bent down to pick up a small log when a shadow appeared in the distance, walking towards her. At first she thought it may be one of their escorts, but it was stooped over. Not that that meant it wasn't a threat. Her fingers went to the shuriken in her belt. A minute later, the figure walked into a patch of moonlight and Sakura saw that it was an old woman, walking with a basket hung on the crook of her arm.

"Hello there," Sakura called out.

The woman jumped slightly, but then a wide, toothless smile broke out on her wrinkled face. "Why heavens, aren't you a surprise!" she said with a chuckle as she hobbled towards Sakura. "I'm out picking mushrooms." Her gaze went from the wood in Sakura's arms to the faint glimmer of firelight through the trees. "Don't tell me you're camping here all alone?"

"No, ma'am! My husband is here as well. He's cooking supper, if you'd like to join us." She kept her voice light and airy. "I'm Shakiko, by the way."

"Ima. Real pleased to meet you. Well, I think I may join you for supper, but you're in for a nasty shock if you plan to stay out in here tonight."

A chill ran up Sakura's spine, maybe this woman knew something. She tried not to betray anything with her voice as she innocently asked, "Why's that?"

"Cause the sky's going to open up sometime around midnight. No ma'am! I wouldn't want to be out in these woods then. Couldn't pay me enough. Why don't you and your husband come stay the night with me, I've got an extra room."

"Oh, that's very kind!" Sakura said as she offered her arm to Ima. "Can I help you? These roots are treacherous."

"Aren't you just a dear!" Ima said as she linked her arm with Sakura and allowed the younger woman to guide her to the campfire.

"Who's this?" Kakashi asked in a voice that was an octave higher than his normal one, cheerier too.

"Sukea, this is Ima-san. Ima-san, this is my husband, Sukea. I met her while she was picking mushrooms, and offered her supper."

"Well, it's not exactly a banquet, I'm sorry to say, but you're more than welcome," Kakashi said with a eye crinkling grin. He stood up and grabbed a stout log. "Here, come sit."

"Aren't you two the sweetest couple," Ima said as she sat down in front of the fire with a sigh. "This is nice! But I was telling your wife that the two of you ought to come spend the night in my house after we eat. There's a terrible storm brewing."

Kakashi looked up at the clear night sky, then back at Ima.

"Oh, you young whipper-snappers always think you know best, but trust my word, not a minute passed midnight there'll be a deluge out here. I've got a real comfortable bed in a private room, too," she added with a knowing wink.

Sakura suspected that the blush that rose to Kakashi's cheeks was no act.

"I think it would be lovely, don't you, dear?" Sakura asked.

He nodded, leaning down to tend the fish. "Very kind."

"Excellent!" Ima clapped her hands together as Kakashi handed her a spear of fish. "Ah, this is delicious, son! I was wondering why your wife was out gathering wood while you cooked, but I see now."

They ate and chatted, Kakashi and Sakura asking her about the area under the guise of finding interesting things to photograph. "You know," Kakashi said, dropping his voice into a conspiratorial whisper, "I've heard that there are ghosts in the woods just north of here. I was hoping to do a little paranormal investigation."

Sakura giggled. "Ghosties again? He's really quiet obsessed."

"Then he's come to the right place," Ima said with a nod. "There was a village massacre there during the last war. Everyone was killed, but they never found the bodies of any of the children. Just vanished."

The war ended eighteen years ago, Sakura thought. There's no way Chie is that old.

"And the ghosts haunt the woods?" Kakashi asked with an excited glint in his eyes.

"Not just ghosts. Some say their spirits became demons. Fierce things." She looked between Sakura and Kakashi skeptically. "I don't think it would be a good idea for either of you to go looking for them. No offense, but you two seem kind of wet behind the ears."

Sakura and Kakashi exchanged a brief glance. "I'm sure we'll be okay, I think ghosts can read auras and they'll know we're peaceful," Sakura said with a smile.

"Maybe," Ima said with a grunt as she stood and picked up her basket. "Come on you two." She looked up at the sky that was now, indeed growing clouded. "May get here a little earlier than I expected."

By the time they made their way to the house tucked in the woods, it had already started to rain. "Miserable weather," Ima grumbled as she unlocked the door and ushered them in. "Come, dears. I have dry clothes you can both change into." She looked Kakashi up and down. "You're a bit taller than my late husband, but I think his things may fit you yet."

She led them to a room in the back of the house, lighting the lamps before she went out and came back a few minutes later with two dry outfits. "There you go, dearies. Now, if you'll excuse me, I am very tired. Make yourselves at home. Everything in the house is at your disposal, and I won't wake you in the morning." She gave them a wink then turned and walked out, shutting the door behind her.

They stood there in silence for a long moment before Sakura looked at Kakashi. His face was red and she couldn't help grinning at him. "Well, Sukea, seems like we've got ourselves a nice warm bed," she said as she patted the mattress. "Kind of small."

He nodded, sweat beginning to form on his forehead.

Part of her was tempted to tease him, but she just raised the clothes in her hand and said, "I'm going to go change. I'll be back in a minute." She went into the small bathroom, grateful for the sink to clean up before she put on the fresh clothes. It was a short, pink nightgown that rested just a few inches below her bottom with a plunging neckline and a short, silken robe. That Ima is a piece of work, Sakura thought as she looked at her reflection, giving serious consideration to just sleeping in the clothes she planned to wear the next day while her soggy clothes dried.

The thought of making Kakashi blush again was just too much, though, so she walked out, finding him tying up his jinbei. His eyes widened as his breath hitched. "Apparently, Ima wants her guests to be very comfortable," Sakura said as she sat on the end of the bed and crossed her legs.

Kakashi swallowed hard. "I-I-I... can sleep on the floor. Just... I mean... you know, so..."

"Oh. My. God," Sakura said, chuckling before she whispered, "You are shy. Where on Earth did that come from?"

She didn't think it would be possible for the blush to grow, but it did. "I... don't know what you're talking about. Just. It's not..."

It was adorable. Unexpected, but adorable.

Standing up, she walked over to him slowly, half expecting him to move away from her at any moment. "Now, I've personally seen you leave the bar with at least five dozen different women over the years and you are obviously weren't afraid to sleep with me, so..." she whispered in his ear, drawing out the last word. "What gives?"

"Well, we're on a mission and..." His heartbeat was faintly audible. "Y-you're still in love with Sasuke."

It was like a bucket of cold water on her. Yes, she was still in love with Sasuke. What was she doing? She gave a single chuckle as she stepped back. "Yeah, I am," she said flatly. "You don't need to sleep on the floor, though. We're both grown ups, friends, and it's not like this would be anything new, really."

OoO*OoO*OoO

Thunder crashed as Kakashi lay awake that night. They'd gone to bed with a few feet of air between them, but as soon as Sakura fell into deep sleep, she'd snuggled up next to him, and now her head was rested on his chest. Her fingers had found their way into his pants and they were wrapped around his cock. He had tried to move her twice, but even in her sleep, Sakura was strong enough that that proved impossible.

She mumbled something in her sleep and her fingers began to move over him. They were almost enough to drive him crazy. Gathering up his will power, he tried to move her again.

"Let me stay, Kakashi," she mumbled.

She's dreaming about me, he thought, his cock swelling until it was almost painfully engorged.

"Sakura," he whispered, gently shaking her shoulder.

"Hmm..." She stirred, looking up at him before her eyes suddenly grew wide and her fingers left his manhood. "Oh my god, I'm so sorry! I..."

"It's okay," he said. "I just... I didn't want you to do anything y-you'd... regret later."

She bit her lip, her gaze going to the quilt and he thought she must be regretting it already, but then she spoke, barely a whisper, "I wouldn't regret it." Her teal eyes locked on his dark ones. "You're afraid." It was an observation, not a question.

His pulse was almost deafening.

"That's why you're acting so shy. You're afraid of whatever this thing is between us."

What is this thing between us? he asked himself as he forced himself not to break eye contact with her. "I-I'm not the kind of guy you want."

She gave a snorting laugh. "And what exactly is my kind of guy?" she whispered. "Men who want to kill me at first?" There was that predatory gleam in her eye that he'd seen the night she'd taken him home from The Broken Cup. "How about I decide what I want?"

He nodded wordlessly as her hand slid up his leg.

"You're the one who said this didn't have to change anything between us, right?" she whispered in his ear, her fingers slipping under his waistband.

It felt like she'd stabbed him in the heart, but he nodded again.

"Then let's just enjoy tonight." She freed his cock, her silken fingers sliding over the shaft like a piston.

He let her undress him, relishing the kisses she trailed over his body, but all the time he was thinking about the fact that this changed nothing. She was going to become the same thing Anko was to him, someone who played with him when the mood struck her, but not someone who wanted to be seen walking hand in hand with him through the market. As his rough fingers slid into her slippery cave, he thought of how in a month or so more, she may decide that he alone wasn't exactly enough for her anymore and then there would be another man rubbing his thumb against her clit.

After the third time he'd came deep within her, they lay, curled up under the sheets, Sakura's leg draped over his, her fingers playing in his hair. "You're a god, you know that?" she whispered breathlessly.

It wasn't the first time he'd heard it.

"So this doesn't change anything?" he whispered as he looked up at the ceiling.

She trailed her fingertip down his neck and over his chest, dancing across the edges of his scars. "Yup."

That's what I thought. He held her a little tighter, fighting against the brokenness. She was in his arms. She would be there in the morning. They would finish their mission. It wouldn't be that bad.


	10. Chapter 10

Kakashi woke with the chill that came when Sakura got up out of bed. "Morning," she said with a sleepy smile. "Come to the shower with me."

"We shouldn't."

"Okay," she drew out the syllable. "We both need a shower, this will save time and water."

He gave her a flat look.

She huffed. "Fine. Do you want the first shower?"

"No, you go on." He watched her as she grabbed her bag and went into bathroom. A few moments later, he could hear the shower running. He sat up, scrubbing his hand over the stubble on his jaw. The awful nervous ache that tripped his words and made him blush had left with his hopes of a real relationship. It was better that way, he decided as he stood up and started to make the bed. Sakura got what she wanted, and he didn't have to worry about looking like an idiot.

She emerged, changed into her clothes, toweling off her hair. "It's all yours," she said. "I'm going to help Ima with breakfast."

"Okay." She probably didn't even hear him as she was already out the door. Maybe she was upset that he didn't want to have sex that morning, but she'd just have to learn to deal with it. Their heads needed to be clear as they started this stage of their mission.

He showered quickly and joined the two women in the kitchen. "Never in all my life have I seen two such early risers," Ima said when he walked in. "Ain't the two of you ever heard what mornings are made for?"

Sakura chuckled. "We wanted to make the early morning market in town. We heard that it's a great place to photograph."

"Well, just see that the two of you stick to the town. It's safer that way. And don't go asking about ghosts or demons or such. Get you in a lot of trouble there, it will."

There was a fake pout on Sakura's lips, but she pretended to relent. "I suppose if that's the safest option, but I still don't think ghosts pose much of a threat."

After breakfast, they thanked Ima for the hospitality and headed out into the foggy woods towards town. Kakashi felt sorry for the two ANBU who had taken turns sleeping out in the rain the night before. He remembered that miserable feeling all too well.

"If either of us find out any information, we'll mention lychees," Kakashi said softly.

"Sounds good," Sakura said, her eyes trained on the road ahead. With each passing mile, she grew more and more serious, and Kakashi knew that she was beginning to feel the weight of what they were walking in to. They were nearing the place her husband had died. There was something sacred about that.

OoO*OoO*OoO

When they got to the village market, they split up. Sakura went towards the produce vendors while Kakashi stayed in the artisan section. It didn't take Sakura ten minutes to discover that there was something amiss. The mere mention of the forest to the north of the village was enough to cause vendors to panic and clam up. She was about to give up and go meet Kakashi when she came across a friendly woman about fifteen years younger than her. "Is there anything special I can help you with, ma'am?" the lady asked as she held out a large metal bowl of fruit. "I have a good deal on papaya."

"Actually," Sakura asked softly. "I was wondering if you could tell me more about the ghosts that are in the woods."

A metal bowl of fruit crashed onto the street, but the vendor barely seemed to notice it for the first few seconds. "The Blood Woods?" she whispered as she bent down with Sakura to start picking up the fruit. "You don't want to go into the Blood Woods."

"Because of the ghosts?" Sakura asked in the bubbly voice of the character she was playing.

The woman looked up and down the street quickly before she leaned in and whispered, "Because of Masao."

"Masao?" Sakura whispered back.

"He's a puppetmaster, but if you mention him here, they'll kill you," she whispered quickly. "You need to go."

"Please," Sakura grabbed the woman's forearm, her eyes pleading. "I have to know what's out there. It killed someone I love."

"I don't know really," the woman whispered, her body trembling. "But every three years the village offers up a child to him. If they don't, he says he'll wipe us out the way he did the Village of the Dawn. Please don't tell anyone I told you this." With that she put the bowl on her hip as she headed down the street quickly disappearing into the crowd.

Sakura turned scanned the marketplace until she spotted Kakashi talking with a man who was making a basket. She waited until he stepped away from the booth to go up to him. "Hi, darling," she said, slipping her hand in his as she guided him away from the crowd. "I don't think we'll find lychees here," she said.

"Do you want me to help you look."

"Not right now. I found just the prettiest place to photograph," she said, pointing towards a cliff in the distance. "I think we can reach it by noon if we hurry."

From the corner of her eye, she saw two men walking towards them with determination. She squeezed Kakashi's hand, but she could see his gaze had already drifted towards them. "Let's get away from this crowd," he whispered with a quick squeeze of her fingers as he guided her through the more sparsely populated streets towards the outskirts of the town.

They were almost to the forest when two ninja dropped down in front of them. "Where are you off to in such a hurry?" the one covered in tattoos asked.

Kakashi lifted his camera with a sheepish smile and said, "Just trying to beat the sun so that I've got the best lighting for my photographs."

"Photographs, huh?" the taller man said as he leaned against one of the buildings. "That why you two are asking so many questions about the blood woods."

"Well, my husband has a little obsession with ghosts," Sakura said, adding a nervous chuckle. "We didn't mean any harm by it."

"No one goes there without permission of the council."

"And where, pray tell, would we go to get such permission?" Kakashi asked in the same upbeat, slightly nervous lilt he always used when he was posing as Sukea.

Both of the men smirked, but their cockiness did not last long. With a quick exchange of glances, Kakashi and Sakura attacked. She punched the tattooed man so hard that she felt his jaw shatter under her fist, while Kakashi put a genjutsu on the tall man, then knocked him out.

"Let's get out of here," Kakashi said and they took off running towards the woods. "You find out anything?" he asked as they leapt through the tree branches.

"That apparently there's a puppetmaster named Masao who's been demanding the village offer up a child every three years. According to the woman I talked with, he massacred a village and that has everyone living in fear of him."

"Hmm."

"What'd you learn?"

"That apparently the trees in the forest are alive."

Sakura almost stumbled on the limb on which she'd just stepped. "All that time and the only thing you figured out was something you knew already?"

"They can attack us; apparently their possessed by the spirits of people who were buried alive under them."

It felt like the blood had frozen in Sakura's veins. "Well... that's different."

"We won't know that any of this is true until we get there, though."

Out of nowhere, the black ops appeared on either side of them as they ran through the trees. "A half mile until we get to the place Uchiha was found, sir," the one in the hawk mask said.

"Very well, lead the way," Kakashi said.

Sakura half expected the Blood Woods to be more creepy, but as they dropped from the tree tops Sakura couldn't see much difference from any of the rest of the forest they'd been through. What she did notice, though, was a place where the ground had been turned over in the last few weeks under a tall pine. Chie had buried him there; ANBU didn't need to tell her that. Walking to the place, she knelt down, digging her fingers deep into the wet earth. She looked up at the slivers of blue sky that pierced the canopy.

In the distance, she could hear Kakashi talking in quick, hushed tones with the ANBU agents. A few minutes later he walked up behind her, his voice low as he said, "They're going to see what they can find. I'll keep an eye out; you take as long as you need." And then he walked away.

In that moment a stiff breeze wrapped around her, but then it felt as if Sasuke had knelt down behind her, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. You need to be careful, his voice echoed in her mind. Stick close to Kakashi. They're coming.

OoO*OoO*OoO

The first sign that there was any trouble was the moment a wall sprung up from the forest floor all around them. Sakura ran towards Kakashi and they stood back to back looking around at the wall which was quickly morphing into a tight series of golems. "Whatever controlling them is out there," he said.

"Brace yourself," Sakura said as she gathered her chakra in her fist. He leapt up just as her fist connected with the ground, shattering it and sending the golems flying in different directions.

"Ah, a talented set," a melodious voice came from the darkness of the forest. "What fun the two of you shall be."


	11. Chapter 11

The moon hung low over the silent battlefield. For fourteen hours they'd fought Masao and the small army he'd bent to his will. Fourteen hours of hell. Sakura's right clavicle had been broken in that last hour, the one where none of them were sure they would see the dawn. Kakashi had been the one to end it. Kakashi?

She's struggled to her feet. A few feet from her, Kakashi was laying face down on the forest floor. Her breath seized in her lungs. Not him too; I can't survive this. Sakura forced her legs to carry her, stumbling over the wreckage, to Kakashi's side before she dropped down beside him. She gently turned his head. He was breathing, albeit shallowly. Looking up, she scanned the forest for any other enemies, but the only person moving was one of the ANBU getting to his feet.

Since he'd lost the sharingan, she'd never known him to over-extend himself in battle the way he had that day. It was a mistake to come here, she thought. If he dies, it will be on your fault. There were so many internal injuries she was surprised that he'd stayed on his feet as long as he had. Bleeding in his lungs and in his abdomen, ruptured spleen, strain on his heart, and that wasn't taking into account the broken bones.

When the golems had fallen away, they saw Masao, a frail looking man, standing just beyond the damage. He pushed the gold bridge of his thick glasses up on his nose and smiled at them as if he'd just welcomed them into his home rather than surround them with massive puppets. "Welcome, ninja of the Leaf," he said. "I must say, after I had to kill the Uchiha, I have been waiting for you to come."

"Masao?" Sakura called out.

Masao bowed low. "One in the same. Tell me, did you enjoy Chie?"

The young girl had been an unwitting trap, for them, for Sasuke. She knew that now. Wiping her eyes with the top of her sleeves, she continued to repair Kakashi. He winced and she bent her head down next to his. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," she whispered into his ear. "Please don't leave me."

"Sa-kura," his voice was barely audible. His left eye was swollen completely shut, but his right one opened slightly.

"Shh, it's okay; you'll be okay." She kissed his forehead. "Just rest, and I'm going to finish fixing you up."

When she stopped the bleeding, she made him as comfortable as she could. "I'm going to have to reset your bones, but I need to check on the other two. Please be still, okay?"

"K."

She knew her chakra reserves were dwindling, but as she approached the two ANBU, there was no doubt in her mind that she would have to expend part of them. The blonde haired one, who didn't look any older than seventeen now that his rabbit mask was discarded beside him, had a gaping hole in his gut from which the other ninja was trying hard to stem the bleeding. "Can you save him?" There was fear deeply buried in the dark eyes behind his hawk mask.

Sakura couldn't bring herself to answer that as she put her hands over him, trying desperately to mend the flesh back together. His bloody hand grabbed her wrist. "You're going to have to hold him down," she told his partner.

"Eiji, you hear me?" Hawk bent down low. "You'd better pull through this, you bastard. There's no damn way I'm carrying your carcass all the way home."

There was a bloody gurgle of laughter from Eiji even as he winced with pain. These were ANBU. They laughed in the face of death.

Children, Sakura's heart quaked in her chest. What inhumanity we visit on children.

She could still see the blank expressions on the faces of the children and young people Masao had turned into weapons. They were gaunt and dressed in rags, just like Chie had been when she was found. Their hands were ink stained up to the elbow. Living puppets, chosen for their ability with artistic jutsu.

The entire forest had become a weapon in Masao's thin hands.

Across the now barren forest, she saw the puppermaster's body, cut in half at the waist, lying amongst the giant splinters of the trees. There were the bodies of four children visible among the debris, too. The others were likely buried under the devastation.

Her eyes went back to Eiji. The bleeding had stopped. He'd have a scar. With any luck, he'd live to show it to his kids one day. There was a sniffle from behind Hawk's mask, and she realized, not for the first time, why hiding their faces was so crucial. Masks were walls that kept the world from seeing you as a human being. She reset his arm manually, wincing with him as the bones in her own chest ground against each other.

Getting up with a grunt, she clapped Hawk on the shoulder and dipped her head down to whisper in his ear, "You did good today. We're all alive because of you." It wasn't wholly true, but neither was it a lie. Hawk was calculating and powerful in battle, but now the only battle going on was the one inside his head. She wondered what his face looked like. She wondered what his real name was.

As she walked back to Kakashi, she saw a small, ink-stained hand poking up from the rubble. Her breath caught. How young was Sarada when her hands were so small? She bend down and felt the wrist. No pulse. Tears stung her eyes. It wasn't fair. None of it.

Kakashi didn't move at all when Sakura sat beside him. She put her hand to her own shoulder, mending the clavicle before she attempted to reset his bones. "Kakashi?" The good eye opened slightly. "I'm going to have to fix your bones."

"K."

She started with the smaller ones stopping between each to perform painkilling genjutsu so that by the time she reached the large bones he was essentially drunk.

"Sakura," he mumbled while she was taking the pain away.

"Yeah?"

"I love you." He gave her a smile that looked lopsided because of the bruising on his face.

"I know, honey," she said as a reflex. She'd heard dozens of men and women confess love to her when their brains were addled with endorphins.

"No, you don't understand. I really, really love you," His eyes closed.

"Last bone's going to be fibula. This one right here," she said as she put her hand on his leg. "Deep breath."

He barely winced. "I wanna marry you. I'd be a good husband."

"You read porn in public," Sakura said with a chuckle to herself that she didn't really feel. Like war, medicine had its own gallows' humor.

"I'll quit."

"Uh-hun," Sakura said as she bound the leg to stabilize it.

"We can have a bunch of kids."

Sakura shook her head as she put her hand over his forehead, manipulating the chemicals to put him into a deep sleep. She sat for a moment looking at his face, normally so flawless, now swollen and bloodied. For what? So that you had answers?

She pulled her knees up under her chin and fought against the urge to cry.


	12. Chapter 12

None of them had fully recovered the next morning, but they knew that they needed to investigate the area. When Sakura stumbled over a broken piece of wood, Kakashi caught her around her waist. "You need to rest," he said in the same way he'd used when she was a child.

"I'll be okay." It was next door to a lie. The truth was she would survive, but at that moment every piece of her hurt. That came with expending too much of her chakra. The rest of her team was on the mend, but for her, it would take several days. That was her role as a medic, though. They protected her so she could heal them when the battle was done.

Kakashi gently led her to a tall stump in a fairly empty area. "Sit for a while. We'll finish up."

Finish up. That meant burying the dead, Sakura thought. At that moment, Eiji moved a large chunk of wood and bend down to shoulder the body of a small girl. Poor boy. The two black ops had spent more time with them since the battle was over than they had the days before, and she'd gotten to know them a bit. Eiji was a sweet kid. How he wound up in ANBU she didn't understand. Maybe she didn't understand how either wound up there. Hawk acted tough, but she'd seen him cry. If her observations of the two were correct, they were more than just teammates. That's a good thing, she thought with a sad smile as she watched Hawk take the child from Eiji, his hand going to the side of the blond's head for a moment. They'll take care of each other.

She closed her eyes as she leaned her head against the rough bark. What she wouldn't give for a soft bed. It felt like she'd just closed her eyes when Kakashi gently shook her shoulder. "Huh?" she asked blearily, looking up at the darkening sky behind him. "I didn't mean to fall asleep."

"I know," he said as he put his arm under hers and easily lifted her to her feet. "You need to see this." He led her through the ruined forest, but she didn't see where he was bringing her until they were right upon it. It looked like a hill cut in half, but as they rounded it, she saw the twin moss covered metal doors, one of them slightly ajar.

There was scant artificial lighting leading down the tunnel, but she could see that it opened up into a well lit laboratory. When they got there, they saw Hawk standing in front of three small children. One didn't appear to be any older than two. "I've got this," she softly said to the ANBU as she walked around him and crouched down in front of the kids. "Hi, are you guys hungry?"

The children looked at her with anxious glances, and the oldest looking one shook his head.

"What's your name?"

The little boy bit his lip.

"Did Masao hurt you?"

At this, the middle child, a girl with big blue eyes stepped forward. Like Chie, her eyes were fierce and terrified, her fat fists clinched at her sides. "Masao god."

"No, Masao wasn't a god," Sakura said softly. "He was just a man, a very bad man."

The girl's brow knit. "Masao god. Give good. Give bad."

"What's your name?" Sakura asked the little girl.

"Chie."

"Chie? What are their names?"

"Hikaru."

Sakura pointed to the older boy and to the little one. "Hikaru?"

They all nodded. Masao had stripped them of even their own identities. If the cages that lined one of the walls were any indication, he'd kept them locked up like animals. Semi-feral children. Suddenly, his death didn't seem like quite enough. Sakura realized there was blood dripping from her palms and she loosened her fists, sealing the skin with a bit of the little chakra she had left.

"Where are your parents?" Sakura's voice was barely above a whisper.

"Dirt and stones."

Dead. They meant dead. She cursed the village in her mind. She cursed Masao. She cursed the Village Hidden in the Mists for not having investigated this before.

Wiping the blood off on the side of her pants, she gently reached out to push a matted mass of hair back behind the little girl's ear. "We're going to take care of you." The Village Hidden in the Mists had made it clear, they had no interest in mentally damaged children, regardless how talented they were. Over a decade of peace had made the prospect of training broken people unpalatable. Any children found were to be either left in the nearest village or taken back with the team to Konoha.

Sakura's gaze drifted to Kakashi, who was looking through files. It was when he became Hokage that conditions for orphans in Konoha had improved. There were now children's homes and a foster care system as well as the children's wing to the mental hospital. They weren't just given a small monthly stipend as he and Naruto had been, but were given adults to look after them, families in many cases.

His words the day before, about giving her a bunch of kids, stuck in her brain and the corners of her lips quirked up for a moment. He'd already given her so many. Every child that walked into the clinic was, in some small way, his child. These children were his too, ones who would be cared for by Konoha because he'd seen to it that no child would have to spend their childhood alone. Considering that, it was sad that the Hatake name would die with him.

But she was thirty-seven, entirely too old to be considering bearing more children. Who knew, in a few years, if Boruto could keep his head on straight that long, maybe he and Sarada would be giving her grandchildren. No, Kakashi's drunken ramblings from the day before were just that. In all likelihood he didn't remember anything he'd said, about children, marriage or love.

OoO*OoO*OoO

They had found an abandoned cabin to bed down for that night. Kakashi had summoned his ninken to patrol, insisting that the two ANBU sleep indoors as it was raining again. He knew he'd owe the pack for that, but he also knew that of all of the available ninja for patrol that stormy night, the eight dogs were going to be the ones best suited for it.

Sakura was sitting beside a pallet bed she'd laid out in the living room for the three children. She was singing low in her slightly off-key voice as she rocked the youngest. After supper, she'd bathed them all, working out most of the tangles from their hair in the firelight as she softly talked to them. He didn't think he'd ever seen anything more beautiful. It almost felt like he was intruding on something sacred.

He remembered when he'd been a little boy, and he'd watch the mothers in the village. His sharp eyes studied the way their hands smoothed the hair away from sweaty foreheads on the playground, the way their lips would kiss the littlest bumps, the way their voices softened slightly when their children came running up to them. As Sakura tucked the little boy under the covers, kissing his dusky forehead before she stood again, he thought that she was the perfect culmination of everything a mother ought to be.

You know that makes you a really sick fuck, the sinister voice in his mind said.

He didn't meet her eyes as she sat down beside him in front of the fire. "You're good at that," he said.

"Putting kids to sleep?" She chuckled. "It helps when they're dog tired. Speaking of," she stretched her arms out in front of her, "I think I'm going to turn in; you coming?" She stood up and started towards the bedroom.

His heart ached. How badly he wanted to follow her into that back bedroom and hold her until sleep took him, but he knew that with each time it would only get a little harder when she inevitably found someone better suited for her. "I think I'll camp out here."

Her footsteps halted and she bit her lip, nodding. "Well, you're welcome to join me if you decide to."

"Thanks."

As she opened the door and gave him one last look over her shoulder. What was that? Lust? No, not quite. Compassion? Maybe. Love? Most likely not.

He couldn't be sure if what he remembered from after the battle was real or a dream, everything seemed to blur together, but was fairly sure he'd told her he loved her. She'd laughed it off. Not the cruel kind of laughter that he'd heard from women when he was younger, but the one of a friend who dearly wished that those words were a joke and thought maybe her own laughter would make it so.

"Please don't leave me." That's what she'd whispered into the pain ravaged darkness and dragged him back from death. Why? Because she didn't want the blood of her friend on her hands. He could appreciate that.

A log fell in the middle of the fire sending embers dancing upward.

The bedroom door opened again and Sakura leaned sheepishly against the frame for a moment, studying him. No, it wasn't lust that burned in her eyes. She gave a tight lipped smile for a moment before she started walking towards him.

"Forget something?" he asked.

"Kind of," she said as she sat on the floor beside him. "You almost died today, and it was my fault..."

"If I remember correctly, it was Masao attacking us."

"But it was my idea to go and find out what happened."

"You uncovered something that could have gotten a lot worse, maybe even started another war eventually. You saved those kids."

"And killed twelve others."

"If you're hellbent on heaping guilt on yourself, you are in the wrong line of work," he said flatly.

She drew her legs up under her chin and sighed as she looked into the flames. "I couldn't have lived with myself if I'd have lost you."

There it is. Guilt was a powerful motivator.

She turned her head towards him, a faint smile playing at the corners of her lips. "I love you, too," it was so low he could barely believe he heard the words.

It didn't feel like he could draw a full breath. This moment was like something from the edge of a dream and he was afraid that if he moved it would be lost. Her smile widened slightly as her thin fingers reached out, running through the side of his hair. "I really, really love you," she said softly.

"You don't mean that."

She gave a single chuckle. Tears began to gather at the corners of her eyes. Damn it all. He hadn't meant to make her cry.

"I-I'm sorry. It's just... you didn't. I thought..."

Sitting up straight, she brushed her eyes with the back of her hand as she scoffed. "You think too much," she said as she pulled him closer to her and kissed his lips. It wasn't like the kisses she'd given him when they'd had sex. This one was gentle, as if she wanted to relish every moment of it. It was brief, too. She leaned her forehead against his, her fingers running through his hair. "I just thought you ought to know that," she whispered before she gave him another quick peck on the lips and then stood up.

"W-where are you going?"

"Back to bed," she said with a sleepy smile. "The invitation's still open." And then she was gone.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura lay back down in the bed, her body still screaming for rest. What did I just do? Staring up at the ceiling, she focused on her breathing. I told Kakashi I loved him! I must be crazy! She felt like an idiot. He'd probably just told her he loved her because of the endorphins. God knows how many women he'd fed that line to over the years. She'd almost watched him die and that had played with her emotions. There were a million reasons she should have kept her mouth shut.

But then the door opened and she looked up to see Kakashi standing there and she knew that she'd meant those words. She might wind up cursing the day she'd uttered them, but she'd meant them. A small smile played on her lips as she pushed back the covers. He sat down beside her, for a moment looking as if he wasn't sure what to do, then he took her hand in his. "Would it be okay... just for tonight, if... I mean, would it be okay if I just held you?"

She chuckled. "Yeah, that would be perfect," she said as he lay down and she rested her head on his chest.

Perfect, she thought as her eyes fluttered shut, his arms wrapped around her and the beat of his heart drumming in her ear.


	13. Chapter 13

They had woken to the screams of one of the oldest boy, who had discovered the doors and the windows were locked. "Welcome to parenthood," Sakura muttered as she climbed out of bed. Kakashi scratched his shaggy hair as he followed her. The two youngest children were cowering in a corner and Hawk was holding the oldest with his arms pinned behind his back.

"Let go!" the boy screamed as he kicked wildly.

Eiji was crouched down in front of him just out of range, his rabbit masked pushed up on top his head. "He can't let ya go 'til ya stop tossin' stuff 'round the room like a crazy person. Understand?"

"He's right," Sakura said, returning Eiji's smile as he looked over his shoulder at her for a moment.

The boy relaxed slightly.

"Let him loose," Sakura said softly and Hawk obeyed. For a minute it looked like the boy would start to throw things again, but his shoulders fell slightly. "So, you can talk."

The boy nodded.

"We locked the house up to keep you all safe, not to trap you," she said. "Now, are you hungry?"

"We can go hunt up some breakfast," Eiji offered with a nod to Hawk.

"That would be wonderful, thank you." She went to the children sitting in the corner. Reaching her hand out, she said, "Come on, let's get your hair done."

OoO*OoO*OoO

By the time they got to the edge of the Land of Fire, the children were babbling with each other, much more at ease. Kakashi hardly considered what they were were doing talking, but Sakura seemed pleased with it. "Pretty, look," the girl said, pointing her finger at a butterfly as it fluttered past them. "Color bird fly."

The oldest boy laughed. "No bird. Flower?"

"It's a bug," Kakashi offered.

The kids all looked up at him as if he had said something incredibly stupid.

"That thing," he pointed at the butterfly. "It's a butterfly; a kind of bug."

"Bu-ter-fly," the girl tried the word on her tongue, then smiled. She looked at the older boy with a look of triumph. "Color bird fly. Bu-ter-fly."

The boy grumbled something and kicked a rock out in front of him, but they went back to their broken conversation.

"I wonder why Masao kept their vocabularies so limited," Sakura said softly.

"Control." Kakashi's eyes darkened. "He only let them know what he needed them to know to do the job he wanted them to do. They were tools." The words were bitter on his lips. After reading Masao's notes, he knew that the man had been involved behind the scenes in the early days of Root. It was sickening how far Danzo's reach stretched. He'd been one of those tools, plucked out of ANBU and bent to Danzo's will.

His gaze went to both side of the road where the ANBU agents were leaping through the trees. Before they left the house, he'd pulled the youngest one aside and given him a quick reminder that he would lose his position if word got out that he'd been so careless with his identity. He wasn't entirely sure the lesson had sunk in. Maybe that was a good thing; he wasn't entirely sure anyone belonged in there more than a few years.

"When we get back to the village," Sakura said, breaking him from his thoughts, "we're going to have to keep things quiet for a while."

He'd expected as much, and just nodded in response.

"Only for a few months, I think," she continued. "Sarada just lost her father, after all. It wouldn't be fair to spring this on her."

No, it wouldn't.

Sakura slid her warm hand into his, her eyes looking up at him. "Are you okay with that?"

"Yeah," he said with a smile he knew she could see even with the mask back on. It was enough to know that she loved him. That could take him through anything.

OoO*OoO*OoO

The next day when they got back to the village, they dropped the kids off at the hospital to be put into the system. The nurse assured them that there were several families on the waiting list. As they left the hospital, Kakashi and Sakura stood on the steps out front. She felt naked in the sunlight, as if everyone around them knew they were now a couple even though they'd stood in that very spot, a few amiable feet of space between them, hundreds of times before. "So," she said with a quick glance down at her feet. "I guess I'd better let Sarada know I'm back."

"I'm sure she'd appreciate that." He squinted as he looked down the street. "I need to go water my plants anyway. I'll see you around."

"Yeah, see you," she said as he slouched off down the street with his hands deep in his pockets. It was so normal, and yet so strange that for a moment, she couldn't remember exactly what she was supposed to do. Digging down deep in the pocket of her pack, she pulled out a rarely used phone and sent Sarada a text asking if she were home.

A few minutes later there was an answer. "Yes, but I'm busy. Are you back?"

She typed back a simple "Yes," and hit send.

"Good ttyl"

Sakura sighed as she pushed the phone back into her bag. "Welcome home," she muttered as she headed back to her house to get started on the reports that Naruto would expect in the next couple days.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi was in the middle of cooking supper when there was a knock on his door. "Give me a minute," he called, turning down the fire. When he opened the door, Sarada was standing there, with red-rimmed eyes and a quart of ice cream.

An hour later found them sitting across from each other on his sofa. "And then," she sniffed, "he says, 'What's the big deal? It's just a harmless kiss.' Can you believe him?"

"It's amazing that he's turned out to be more knuckle-headed than his father."

Sarada gave a miserable chuckle before she took another bite of cookie dough ice cream. Swallowing hard she said, "I mean, she's not even a kunoichi. She's not even pretty. She... she's plainer than me. I didn't think anyone was plainer than me."

Kakashi pursed his lips letting her rant.

"Maybe I ought to cut my hair." She stood up and walked to the mirror that was hung in the foyer. She picked her hair up, testing it. "Do guys like short hair?"

"Hmm, I think the better question would be why change yourself to suit someone else?" Kakashi asked as he stood up and walked behind her. He put his hands on her shoulders. "Know what I see?"

"Let me guess, 'A very beautiful, talented young lady,'" she imitated his voice.

He chuckled. "Yes, but I also see someone who wants very badly to be loved. Now, maybe Boruto actually does love you," she snorted, but he continued, "and maybe you love him, but I think this little breakup is probably a good thing for both of you. It'll give you time to find out who you are and what kind of love you really want."

"I will never understand why you're not married."

"I hear it's because I read porn in public."

Sarada broke out into peals of laughter. "That is pretty gross."

"Ah, but it made you laugh. See, my unsavory habits are not without merit."

"You're an awful example," but she was still giggling as she went back to the living room to pick up their bowls.

"Or," he drew out the word, "you could consider that my habits were an excellent cautionary tale that kept you from developing such anti-social tendencies."

"I have no idea how I turned out so normal. You know," she said, pausing on her way towards the kitchen, "you ought to ask mom out."

He was glad for the mask, because it hid most of his shock. "I... might do that."

"Leave Icha Icha at home, though." Sarada pointed a finger at him with a stern look.

"Promise."

"And if you ever cheat on her, I'll kill you."

"I would expect nothing less."

OoO*OoO*OoO

That night he woke to the sound of his back door opening. Faster than most people could see, he grabbed a kunai from this nightstand. When his bedroom door opened, the blade in his fist stopped six inches away from Sakura's neck. "That's a really good way to get yourself killed," he grumbled.

"I'm sorry," she said as she gently took the kunai from his hand, laying it on the dresser before she laced her fingers with his. "I was lonesome."

"Really?" His gaze softened as he brushed her hair back behind her ear.

"Really really."

"You're going to keep rubbing that in my face, aren't you?"

"Yes, sir," she said with a beaming smile as she tiptoed up and kissed his lips.

"You know if you keep spending the night here, people are going to talk."

"I'll leave before dawn," she said as she worked her hands under his shirt, running over the ridges of his abs. "Do you want me to go now?"

He shook his head. There was no way he would ever want her leave. Picking her up, he pressed her against the wall, his mouth claiming hers. With her legs wrapped around his waist, he could feel the damp heat of her sex pressed against him. "I hate those sweatpants," he whispered against her lips.

"You could always cut them off me." Her eyes had that glint in them again.

God, he wanted her. Reaching out as he set her down he grabbed the kunai, and deftly cut the pants away. They fell to the floor in a pile.

"Poor pants," she said with a playful pout. "What'd they ever do to you?"

Kakashi fell on his knees. "They kept me from this," he said before he pressed his face into her pussy.

OoO*OoO*OoO

They were curled up together in his blankets, fingers and legs intertwined as they looked up at the almost full moon. "You're going to have to go to my house and get me another pair of pants," Sakura said with a playful smirk.

"Or you'll have to stay here pantless forever."

She slapped his chest and he winced. "Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, sore ribs," she said, leaning down and kissing the place where she'd hit him.

He chuckled. "All better. You know, Sarada came by this evening."

Her smile fell. "Wha..? I texted her and she said she was busy."

"She and Boruto broke up."

"And she came to you?" She didn't hide the hint of hurt in her voice. "But I'm her mom. She's supposed to come to me with guy problems."

"Sorry," and he genuinely was.

"It's okay. Is she alright?"

"She'll be fine. She did have an interesting suggestion, though."

"What's that?" Sakura asked as she traced a figure eight over his first two knuckles with her forefinger.

"That I ask you out."

Sakura pushed herself up on her elbow. "Are you serious?"

"Cross my heart, hope to die," he said, drawing an X over his chest. "So would you go out with me?"

"You mean, on a date date? Like, you bring me flowers date?"

His heart dropped, it was going to be Anko all over again. "I mean... I thought so, but if... if that's too dorky..."

She giggled. "Nope," she said, punctuating the word with a kiss on his nose. "That's just the perfect amount of dorky. I like crocus."

As she lay her head back down on his chest, he thought that there was no way he'd ever done anything good enough in his life to deserve that moment. It was fragile and consuming and terrifying all at once.

He smiled as he dropped a kiss on top her cotton candy colored hair.

Crocus.


	14. Chapter 14

They'd been in the middle of a mission. She shouldn't even have known who he was, but then again, how many ANBU had silver hair? They were supposed to be on stake out. He was supposed to be her bodyguard. But she'd backed him up against a wall, her breasts pressed up against him as her fingers ran over his crotch. He'd frozen, his eighteen-year-old brain completely incapable of processing what was happening.

Anko chuckled. "Can it be that I've finally figured out what scares the Cold-Hearted Hatake?"

She'd been right, he was terrified. Anko had that effect on men. But he'd learned quickly; so quickly that Anko felt it her civic duty to share tales of his skills with any woman willing to listen. Back then, he hadn't yet sorted out the difference between sex and love, so he'd relished the attention that that kind of legend brought. It wasn't until he was pushing thirty that he realized what he really wanted was someone to come home to, someone to talk with about their how their day had gone. So he'd asked Anko out. It made sense at the time.

Except that Anko was not a one man kind of woman.

Kakashi walked into The Broken Cup with a sense of dread. He'd never had to do this before. As he walked up to Anko, who was sitting on Genma's lap, he couldn't help but feel that he'd rather face Masao again than go through this. "Hey, Hatake, you're right on time," she said with a lopsided grin. "This idiot says that he's a better aim than you are." It was a long running hobby of hers, pitting them against each other. It reminded him a bit of the way Guy always used to challenge him.

He ignored the bait. "Can I talk to you for a minute?"

She looked momentarily shocked between the two men, but Genma lifted her up and swatted her ample butt in Kakashi's direction. "Don't keep her too long," Genma drawled around his senbon.

"I swear," Anko said as Kakashi led her to a back booth, "every time I see you, you're a little gloomier. What gives?"

He leaned his elbows on the table, and said low, "I can't sleep with you any more."

She threw back her head and laughed. "Oh, god! Don't tell me you damaged the goods," she said a bit too loud.

He bit back a groan. "I'm dating someone."

She laughed even harder, but it died away when she looked at the flat expression he was wearing. "You're serious?"

He nodded.

"You poor, miserable bastard," she said sympathetically.

"I'm actually happy," he said.

"Hmm, from where I'm sitting, you don't look it."

"That's because I'm trying to break up with you," he said just above a whisper.

Laughter overtook her again. "Break up with me?!" she gasped. "Hatake, when did I ever give you the idea that we were an item?"

He assumed that most people would have considered a thirty-two year sexual relationship would have counted for something, but as he looked across the table, he saw that it obviously didn't to her. For some reason, that was actually comforting.

She grinned at him as she stood up and walked around the table, leaning over to plant the most chaste kiss she'd ever given him on his cheek just before she slapped it gently. "I just hope she's as sweet as you deserve," she said. "Have fun, Hatake. If it doesn't work out, you know where to find me."

OoO*OoO*OoO

The next day at noon there was a knock on Sakura's office door. "Come in," she called without looking up from her paperwork.

When she glanced up, she saw Anko sitting on the edge of her desk, running her fingers over the beveled edge. "So, you and Hatake?"

"Excuse me?" Sakura feigned ignorance.

"Don't play stupid, kid, it doesn't become you."

Sakura resisted the urge to swallow hard. Anko was one of Kakashi's oldest friends and, if rumors were true, lovers, but the truth was she terrified Sakura. Even after Anko had started working at the Academy, she was impulsive and prone to fits of violence. "What do you want to talk about?" Sakura asked.

"Spoken like a true shrink." Anko chuckled. "Look, what I tell you, it doesn't leave this room. You got that?"

"Yeah."

"Hatake loves you."

"I know," Sakura said.

"No, you don't." There was something fierce flickering in Anko's eyes. "Everybody he's ever loved has either been killed or killed themselves. Fuck, even Guy's death tore him up. Now, I know nobody's got complete control over when their time's up, but I swear if you off yourself, I'll find some way to resurrect you so that I can torture you to death, and if you fuck around with his heart, I'll carve yours out your chest. You got that?"

Sakura nodded.

"Good," Anko said with a smile as she hopped down from the desk.

"Did you love him?" Sakura asked as Anko was on her way to the door.

She didn't turn as she said, "I've only ever loved one person. Hatake's not him."

"Was it Orochimaru?"

Anko's head whipped around, and she glared at Sakura. "You're more fucked up than I thought you were. Just take care of Hatake. Got me?"

Sakura nodded.

The chill in the air as the door closed was almost palpable. In the last year, since Sarada had moved out, Sakura found herself rubbing shoulders with Anko more often than she had in the past, but she'd never been on the receiving end of the woman's famous temper. The thing was, she didn't realize was that she still hadn't been.

OoO*OoO*OoO

That evening, Sakura's bed was covered in clothes. Ino was perched on the edge of the dresser, her head cocked to the side as she critically eyed the red dress Sakura had just emerged wearing. "Not short enough."

"It's a first date," Sakura grumbled.

"With Konoha's resident pervert."

"He's not like that."

Ino looked at her friend skeptically.

"He's not."

"Uh-hun." Ino grabbed a black mini-skirt and a purple sequin tank top and thrust them in Sakura's hands. "Try these on."

Sakura crinkled up her nose. "I'm not wearing your hooker clothes."

"I beg your pardon, Prude. You're dressed like your mother."

"Leave my mom out of this."

The doorbell rang.

"Damn it," Sakura muttered as she hurried to the mirror, straightening the red dress. "How do I look?"

"Like someone in a retirement home," Ino said as she looked regretfully at the mini-skirt. "I'm going to let him in, you'd better hurry up and fix that rat nest you call hair."

"Shove it, Pig."

Ino laughed her way out the room. As Sakura hurriedly put the last touches on her hair and make-up, she heard Ino let Kakashi in the house. Her stomach was twisted up in knots, which, she knew, was ridiculous. But, she couldn't remember the last time she'd been on a date. It was before she'd gotten together with Sasuke. Twenty-something years. She groaned as she let her head hang for a moment.

"Get a grip on yourself, you've already slept with the man," she said under her breath to her reflection. Giving herself one more glance, she hurried out the door and down the stairs.

Kakashi's eyes widened as they connected with hers. "Y-you're beautiful," he said.

"Thanks," she said, taking in the sight of him in a suit, holding the bouquet out to her. "You're very handsome yourself," she added as she sniffed the purple flowers.

"Aww," Ino said, crinkling up her nose. "You're both adorable and disgusting. All at the same time."

Sakura gave her a sharp look.

"Aaand, I'm off to clean up your mess upstairs. I'll lock up when I'm done." Ino sing-songed as she added, "Don't you two do anything I wouldn't?"

"Which excludes, what exactly?" Sakura asked.

Ino just winked as she walked up the stairs again.

In her absence, Sakura suddenly felt shy again. "I ought to go put these in water," she said, hurrying off to the kitchen. The light sandalwood of his cologne wrapped around her like a blanket as he followed her. "These are beautiful."

"Thanks," he said. "Ino enjoyed teasing me while I was at the shop."

"I'm sure." Sakura giggled as she put them in a lead glass vase and set it on the windowsill, standing back to admire the effect. "At least you didn't get threatened. Anko dropped in to see me today, by the way."

Kakashi blanched. "I'm sorry. I thought she was okay with the thought of me dating you."

"Oh, she's fine with you dating me," Sakura said. "But if I ever break your heart, she'll carve mine out. Almost a direct quote."

"She's very... Anko."

"Yes," Sakura said, sliding her hand into his.

"If it's any consolation, Sarada told me she'd kill me if I cheat on you."

"I'll kill you if you cheat on me," Sakura said cheerily as they walked out the house.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Over the years, Kakashi had had a lot of dreams of what a "real" date would be like. Nothing had prepared him for that night with Sakura, though. Because what he hadn't expected was how natural it all would be, and how that familiarity would not rob any of the magic of it. She leaned against his arm as they walked down the street, pointing out a street performer just before she broke into a jog, pulling him towards the live music that poured out of an open air club. As they danced, those teal eyes, the ones he'd grown so well acquainted with, danced with light and love when she gazed at him under the light of paper lanterns.

Hours later, they walked out along the river, away from the bustle of the village nightlife. "You know," he said as they stopped at a bench and sat down. "This is my first date."

She chuckled. "I think this is my third, so I'm not much ahead of you, but you're doing a very good job of it."

He brushed her hair away from her shoulder and kissed her neck. "What do you want to do now?"

"Hmm, well, I have a very strict policy against sleeping with guys on the first date."

He gave her sad puppy-dog eyes.

"But, I may make an exception," she said as she pulled down his mask and kissed his lips. "Tonight's all about firsts, after all."


	15. Chapter 15

The next two weeks passed like a dream for Kakashi. He'd taken his share of ribbing from their friends, but as he lay, curled around Sakura, her back pressed against his abdomen, in the wee hours of the morning, he thought that hardly any price at all. She had two outfits hanging in his closet and a few set of extra lingerie in his dresser. Her toothbrush was in the holder beside his. Sarada had started calling at his house before she even rang her mother's if she were looking for her.

Her alarm on her cell phone went off and she started to stir before he had the chance to silence it. "G'mornin'," she mumbled as she turned over and nuzzled her head into his chest, wrapping her arms around him as if he were a teddy bear. "I don' wanna go to work."

"You've got three hours before you have to be there," Kakashi said, languidly running the pads of his fingers over her forearm.

She smirked up at him before she climbed out of bed and sashayed to the bathroom, leaving the door open as she brushed her teeth and turned the water on. Lifting a well muscled leg, she dipped her toes into the stream of water, revealing the perfect pink cloud that hid her womanhood.

Morning sex was something he decided he definitely liked, he thought as he watched the hot spray of water cascade over her curves. He watched her until he saw her finger slip in between her legs, then he climbed out of bed and walked up behind her, putting one of his hands over hers.

"I thought you'd never get here," she purred.

"How did you ever survive on your own all those years?"

"I have a very good vibrator," she said as slid her hand out from under his and leaned her head back against his chest, her hips grinding against his hand.

"Vibrator, huh?" There were certain perks that came with having trained for years to use lightening fast hand signs. Within a few minutes she was writhing on his hand, her moans reverberating against the tiles.

"Fuck me, Kakashi," she pleaded. "I need you."

He bent her over, pressing the head of his thick cock up against her silky core, his arms wrapped around her waist. Unwilling to wait for him to finish teasing her, she pushed herself down onto his shaft, letting out a small hiss as the full length of him went into her. Her pussy was a vice around him. Each stroke was like diving into heaven. He reached around and grabbed her slick breasts, his fingers tightening around her nipples as he drove into her. Each time he squeezed her nipples, her pussy clamped down harder on him.

"Oh, god, I'm..." Sakura panted, her words caught in a wanton moan as she came hard, her slick juices dripping down their legs with the bathwater. But he wasn't done with her yet. Popping his cock out he turned her around, his lips claiming hers as he picked her up and pushed her against the wall, impaling her again. Each time he pushed himself into her she made a small, mewing sound.

He was close, so close. His balls tightened. The head of his cock swelling into almost a knot at the wall of her cervix. Maybe she sensed it too, because she bit his earlobe just before she whispered, "I love you, Kakashi." Those words, more than any filthy thing she could have said were what brought him to the edge the fastest. His thrusts became erratic as his breath caught. He wanted to claim every inch of her.

"Fuck," he growled the word as he held her tight, his seed rushing into her as his body trembled with ecstasy. This was his woman. "I love you," he whispered against her neck almost like a prayer. "I'll always love you."


	16. Chapter 16

Every Thursday, Sakura worked with hospice. It had started with her going to see terminally ill children, but the hospice director had convinced her to take on other cases as well. It just so happened that this particular Thursday was the day before Kakashi's birthday. He was walking with her hand in hand through the streets of Konoha; her on the way to her patient's house and him on the way to the market to pick up supplies for a cake.

"So, I don't get any say in this, do I?" Kakashi asked, an amused gleam in his eyes as he looked down at Sakura.

"Nope," she said, popping the P.

"No more than thirty people, right?"

"Give or take," Sakura sing-songed as she swung his arm. "I mean, there are an awful lot of people who want to wish you a happy birthday."

He let her guide him through the streets, but as they turned on to the street of the Inuzuka clan compound, his heart dropped. The wide gates were open and from them he could see that door, the one he'd stood in front of as a thirteen year old boy. "You okay?" Sakura asked as she looked up at him.

Scoffing, he stopped in front of the gate and smiled down at her. "Of course," he said, putting his hands on both sides of her face before he leaned down and kissed her lips. "I'm just trying to figure out how we'll fit half of Konoha in the house."

"It's a very large house," Sakura said with an amused smirk.

"Meet you back at home," he said, turning from her and walking towards the market. It was stupid, he thought, that thirty-eight years later the sight of that door still stung. He'd watched his half brother and sister rise through the Academy then go on to raise families of their own. He'd seen his mother's brown hair gradually turn gray. Time marched on for all of them, but that pain was still there, buried deep, but still able to reach out and grab him with something so commonplace as a door.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura knocked on the red door, smiling at the flowers growing in the little garden. It was Atsuko Inuzuko that opened the door. She was about ten years older than Sakura but didn't look it. Her narrow face broke out in a girlish grin at the sight of Sakura. "Mama's going to be so glad it's you today," Atsuko said in her bubbly voice as she ushered Sakura into the house. "She's not quite as fond of Dr. Yumo. You'll make her day."

When Sakura went into the upstairs bedroom, though, she found the woman crying in her chair by the window. "Mrs. Inuzuko, are you in pain?" Sakura asked as she pulled up a chair beside her.

Mrs. Inuzuko gave a small, sad chuckle and shook her head as she wiped away her tears. "Forgive me," she said. "I was just overwhelmed by memories for a moment."

"That happens," Sakura said with a reassuring smile.

"Would you mind if I ask you a personal question?" The old woman's voice was soft, her gaze not leaving the window.

"No, I don't think I would."

"How long have you been dating Kakashi Hatake?" There was a hint of disapproval in her voice.

A blush rose to Sakura's cheeks and she fought it back. "A few weeks. Trust me, any warnings you have, I've already heard from my mother."

"Is he happy?"

The question took Sakura by surprise. "Yes, he is. Well, actually right now I think he's a little miffed that I invited so many people to his birthday party, but otherwise, yes."

There was a faraway look in the woman's eyes as she smiled to herself and said, "That's true, tomorrow is his birthday, isn't it?"

"Is he a friend of yours?"

She shook her head. "No, unfortunately not. I was friends with his father, long ago, in another lifetime."

"I hear he looks a lot like his father."

"Yes, he does. Sakumo Hatake was the most handsome man I ever saw, but don't tell my children I said that," she added with a chuckle. "He was my closest friend when we were growing up. My father hated him. The integrity of clan lineage was of the utmost importance. Sakumo posed a threat to that."

Sakura was glad the woman wasn't looking at her because at that moment, realization dawned on Sakura. That face, ravaged by age and disease, still looked enough like Kakashi's that she was surprised she hadn't seen it before. How often had people pointed out that Kakashi's nose was better than Kiba's, and the ninken, traits of the Inuzuka clan.

"I could ask him to come with me next week," Sakura said, treading cautiously. "If you were friends with his father, maybe he'd like to meet you."

Fear suddenly flooded Mrs. Inuzuka's face, her eyes pleading as she said, "Please don't bring him here. I don't think I could bear it."

Sakura nodded, but it didn't sit well with her. How could she let Kakashi's mother die without at least giving him the opportunity to make amends with her? How could she let this woman, who she'd grown so fond of over the last few months, die with such regret? "So what was Sakumo-san like when he was younger?" she asked, feeling this was perhaps a good way to open up the subject.

Fumi giggled, which turned into a cough. "I'm sorry. He was so incredibly sweet, the kind of boy you didn't mind sitting and weaving flower crowns with me. But he was also the most talented in our class. The White Fang of The Leaf. Watching him fight was a thing of beauty."

"It sounds like you were very fond of him."

"I was," she chuckled softly, her lips pursing before she added, "such a stupid young girl."

"Why is that?"

"I was betrothed to my husband by the time I was three. Bloodline traits must remain pure," she said in a cold, formal voice that didn't sound like her own. "You see, it didn't matter that I loved Sakumo. I prayed, oh I prayed..." Her gaze seemed to be a million miles away, as if she were watching her younger self make mistakes she'd regretted too many years.

Sakura resisted the urge to lean forward. "What did you pray for?"

"My son to be born looking like me," she said, tears welling up in her eyes. "If he would have been, I could have kept him. I wanted so badly to keep him. But father told me that if he came out looking like a Hatake he would kill him. I only just got him away; I knew Sakumo would keep him safe, keep him hidden. You see, we told my husband that he was stillborn."

"Fumi-san, does Kakashi know any of this?"

"What difference would it make?!" Fumi snapped. "It changes nothing!" She coughed hard, wiping blood away from her lips with a napkin before she spoke again. "I could have stood up to my father, to my husband, but I didn't. I'm a coward. In five decades the only kind thing I did for my child was to keep my family from killing him, and now that I'm dying it's too late."

"No, don't you see, it's not."

Fumi's eyes were fiery as she glared at Sakura. "He has survived and thrived in this life because he is strong, stronger than either me or Sakumo alone. He has no need for an old, dying woman."

"But you're his mother."

"It doesn't matter. This is my decision to make. Not yours."

"What about him? Shouldn't he know that you're dying?"

Fumi's eyes softened slightly, her thin fingers picking at the edge of the blanket that covered her legs. "Tell him," she said, her voice heavy with bitterness. "Tell him and see for yourself."

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi was putting the cake in the oven when Sakura came into the house. Her shoulders slumped slightly as she hung her purse on the rack and slid her sandals off. "Want a cup of tea?" he asked as she walked into the room. "It looks like you had a hard day."

She sat at the breakfast bar, her elbows resting on the cabinet, her head rested on her hands. It looked like she was debating with herself about something important and he walked up to the other side of the cabinet, mirroring her as he gave her a slight smile. "What's wrong?"

"You told me once that you knew who your mother was," she said, looking down at the marble counter top.

Bile rose up in his throat. She'd been to the Inuzuka compound that morning. Could she possibly know? "I met her once," he said flatly.

"Her name is Fumi, isn't it?"

His jaw flexed, but he nodded.

"She's dying, Kakashi," she said just above a whisper as her sympathetic gaze locked on his eyes.

"That's too bad for Asahi and Atsuko." They'd grieve the loss of their kind-hearted mother.

"She loved you."

That was too much. He gave a sardonic laugh as he stood up straight. "She tell you that? That she loved me?! She loved me so much that when my dad died, she didn't even bother to check if I was okay. She loved me so much when I didn't think I could go on any more and I went to her she told me to get out of her life. She loved me so much that she threatened to kill me if I showed my face in the village! That sound like love to you?!"

Sakura didn't flinch as he ranted, but there was a patient sort of pity in her eyes that galled him. She was looking at this like a shrink, she was sitting there analyzing him, trying to fix him. Coming from a perfect family, there was no way she really understood any of this, and he knew that any argument he had with her would be futile.

Drawing a deep breath, he pushed the hurt away. "If Fumi Inuzuka lives or dies, it's no concern of mine," he said with an air of finality as he forced a smile. "Her real children will take good care of her."

It looked as if Sakura would argue, but with a resolute sigh she nodded. "I'm sure they will," she said softly as she climbed down from the stool.

"You want the tea?" he asked.

"No, I've actually got some things I need to pick up at the house. I'll see you tonight," she said as she walked around and gave him a peck on the cheek.

Silence flooded the house after the door clicked closed. In his mind, he could still see Fumi's cold eyes as she pushed him away, hear the acidity of her threat. She was dying. So what? Everyone dies eventually. She'd go in a comfortable bed surrounded by family who loved her. She had no right to ask anything of him. None.


	17. Chapter 17

Sixty-two Years ago:

It was a perfect summer day, the kind that were best spent outside rather than mucking out dog yards. So naturally Fumi Inuzuka escaped the family compound as soon as her father was too busy to notice. Plucking up her puppy, Taiki, she tucked her in the front of her shirt before she ran out through the streets of Konoha. I'll be in trouble when I get back, but it's worth it, she thought as she skidded to a stop in front of the small house on the outskirts of the village where Sakumo Hatake lived with his two great-aunts.

"Oh, if it isn't Fumi," one of the old ladies said in a warbling voice as she opened the door. "Saku-kun! Your friend is here!"

"Thanks, auntie," he said, tiptoeing up to give her a kiss on her wrinkled cheek before grabbed Fumi's hand and they ran into the yard. "I'll be back by supper!"

"Have fun, dearies!" the woman called as she waved them off.

"I can't believe your dad let you come," Sakumo said as they ran through a field towards the pond where they often went swimming.

Fumi burst into peals of laughter. "He didn't."

Sakumo's feet halted as his eyes grew wide. "You need to go back. I don't want you getting hurt again."

She rolled her eyes. "He's going discipline me whether I come home now or after supper. I just as soon have a good day, right? Come on, I'll race you!" And then she tore off ahead of him, her tanned legs stretching out over the fresh cut hay field as her laughter carried on the wind. She'd gone about fifty yards before she realized he wasn't following her. Turning around, she sighed as she walked back towards him. "You know what you look like, standing there?" she asked. "A scarecrow. That's what I think I'll call you from now on: Kakashi."

He gave her a flat look.

Holding her arms out, she drooped her head to one side and said, "Caw-caw!" before bursting into laughter. "Come on, don't ruin today before it has to be ruined. Last one to the pond has to buy the other one dumplings. Bet you can't beat me, Kakashi."

This time when she ran, he followed her, quickly matching her pace. In the last seconds, though, he let her win. He always let her win. Because the gleam in her cat-like eyes was pretty when she smiled, and he always had more money than she did for things like dumplings.

Fifty-one Years Ago- Inuzuka Clan Shrine...

Fumi looked up at the full moon, her body trying to relax in between contractions. How the silver light reminded her of Sakumo's hair. She leaned against the window of the room that had been her prison cell for the last few months. Her eyes stung as she thought of what Sakumo must think of her now. Another contraction took her, but she wouldn't cry out. He must not know.

"It's tradition," her father had told her husband, "for the eldest daughter of the family to deliver her firstborn child at the shrine." Her father was there to see to it that things went smoothly, which meant that if the child looked like an Inuzuka it would be spared, but if it looked like a Hatake it would be killed before anyone else saw the abomination.

Eight months before she'd been so full of joy. She and Sakumo were in love and when he came back from the mission he just left on, they would be married. Her family be damned. She remembered sneaking back into her father's house just a little past midnight, carefully tiptoeing through the darkened corridors until she got to her room. No sooner had she let out a sigh of relief than she was thrown to the floor by the back of her father's hand landing hard on her cheek.

Wiping her bloody nose she looked up through the tears to see her father standing over her, trembling with rage. "You reek of Hatake, you worthless bitch!" he growled at her. With one hand he hoisted her up by the collar; he put his other hand to her abdomen. "You let him breed you?"

She'd been feeling strange, but had blamed it on the nervousness of having to hide their relationship. For a moment she was terrified that he would kill the child in her womb, but instead he dropped her into a heap. A sickening smile formed on his lips. "This will just move up our plans, now won't it?"

The next night, he invited Riichi Inuzuka to supper. Riichi was her third cousin, and they had been engaged since they were small children. There was nothing particularly wrong with him except for the fact that he was not Sakumo. Riichi looked a good deal like Fumi, he had brown cat-like eyes and brown hair that he kept unfashionably short. He was kind, but not exceptionally smart and not funny at all.

All that night Fumi's father plied Riichi with sake. On his way out the dining room, Mr. Inuzuka said loudly, "I think it's time for me to retire. You two behave yourselves." But as he passed Fumi, he whispered, "If he's not in your bedroom in the morning, you will regret it."

And so she'd brought Riichi to bed. She put a genjutsu on him as she stripped off his clothes, making him think that she was making love to him. As the boy lay there, moaning, her mind was on Sakumo. When Riichi shot streams of white hot cum all over his abs, Fumi wiped him clean, thinking of how this would be her life. The only thing she had left of Sakumo was the child in her belly, and if fate were as unkind as it always seemed to be, she would probably have to watch it die at her father's hands.

That night was the first night she prayed that the child she carried looked like her. She prayed for slit pupils, tanned skin, and dark hair. She prayed as she sobbed into her pillow that this baby could be passed off as Riichi's because then it would not be as if she'd lost everything.

But fate is cruel. It had been cruel when it stole her mother at her own birth. It had been cruel when it handed her to her father. It had been cruel when it had her engaged before she was able to understand what marriage was. It had been cruel when it made her fall in love with Sakumo.

When her baby boy was born, it was a shock of silver hair that she first saw. When he opened his eyes, there were wide, slate colored pupils there. He was a beautiful child, even covered in her blood. How happy she would have been that he looked like Sakumo if only things had been different.

She fed him and wrapped him tight in blankets with the few things she knew Sakumo would need. Checking the genjutsu she'd put on her father, she walked out the house. "Come, Taiki," she whispered to the gigantic dog that was laying near the front door. The genjutsu wouldn't last much longer once she got out of range. He would wake when he smelled the blood. Taiki was fast, though, she knew as she rode on the back of her dog through the woods. No other hound could catch her. Fumi clutched her child against her breasts as she rode. "Don't worry," she whispered against the rushing wind. "Your daddy will take good care of you."

Sakumo Hatake was woken by banging on the door of his apartment. As soon as he opened the door, a package was thrust into his arms, and it took him a moment to process that the bundle was a baby and that the person at his doorstep was Fumi, blood dripping down her legs, sweat pouring off her face. The last thing he'd heard, she'd married one of her cousins and was waiting for a child.

"Fumi, what... What happened?"

"He's your son," she said hurriedly as she looked over her shoulder. "In his wraps there's the location of a wet nurse a few villages over. Take him away; don't let anyone know he's mine! Father will kill him! You know he will!"

"Wha..? Fumi, slow down."

"I can't slow down!" she snapped at him. "If you want your child to survive, you'll take him to that woman!"

Sakumo's eyes narrowed slightly. "I'm not going anywhere, and you're not either. I love you!"

"Don't you see!? None of that matters anymore! I'm a married woman! It's not just going to be my father that comes after you, it will be the whole clan! Please."

He looked down at the sleeping child, his face so much like his mother's. "Everyone will know as soon as they look at him..."

"Then make him wear a mask! Tell him... tell him the best ninja in the world hide their identities! Anything! Tell him his mother was from another village. Tell him she died in childbirth."

"Fumi, stay with me! I'll take care of you," Sakumo pleaded as she started to turn away.

She shook her head, tears cascading from her eyes. "I don't love, Sakumo. I never did." It was the first time she lied to him. "I kept your child alive for the friendship we had as children, nothing more. If you're smart, you'll keep him hidden."

And then she was gone, leaping back on her ninken as she tore off into the night. From the distance, he could hear the snarls and yelps of other hounds, perhaps tracking her. The child in his arms stirred and he went into the house with him. Carefully unwrapping him, Sakumo found a summoning scroll and a short note that read, "For when your little Kakashi grows up."

He left his apartment that night with his son only to return in the morning empty handed. Three years later, he would return from a mission with a silver-haired toddler at his side. Even at three years old, the boy's face was masked. A prodigy. That's what they called him, because Sakumo had raised him to always strive to be the best shinobi he could; which included never revealing his true face to the world.

Forty-five Years Ago...

There were never many people for the preliminary rounds of the chunnin exams. Fumi went under the guise of showing her twins what they would be doing in a few short years, but clutching Asahi and Atsuko's hands, her eyes were on the little boy with the hair that looked like moonlight and the black face mask. Kakashi Hatake.

"Mama," Asahi asked as Kakashi pushed himself up after a particularly brutal attack from his opponent, "why are you crying?"

Fumi forced a smile, pushing away the tears. "I was just imagining what it will be like to watch you two out there. A mother always worries about her babies."

Thirty-eight Years Ago...

Lightening crashed overhead, but inside Fumi's home was warm and cozy. In the living room, the twins were playing shogi while Riichi sat watching them, giving Atsuko pointers, much to Asahi's chagrin. Fumi was in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on supper, giggling at their antics when there was a knock on the door.

On the doorstep, soaked to the bone, one red-rimmed eye visible, was her first born son. Before she could even open her mouth, he wrapped his arms around her, the moisture from his clothes seeping into hers. She panicked. She couldn't pull him into the house. It wouldn't be fair to her family. She couldn't linger with him outside. Even on a stormy night, there were always people in the Inuzuka compound looking for things that were out of place.

And Kakashi Hatake was out of place.

"What are you doing here?" It came out harsher than she'd wanted it to, but as shock flooded his face, she realized that this was what may keep him safe and she didn't allow her face to soften.

"I just...I... Do you know who I am?" There was a pleading in his voice, like someone hanging on to their last hope. It tore at her heart.

"Of course I know who you are! Your father and I had an understanding that you were not going to contact me!" Leave. Please, leave. Hate me. Hate me and go.

"Dad's dead." It cracked like a whip. It was a terrible thing to grieve for someone privately. For months after Sakumo's suicide, she'd cry at the slightest thing. She'd blame it on hormones, on the runt of the litter dying, on a broken tea pot that nobody else knew she'd thrown on the floor in frustration.

"Yes, I know." Nothing would change that fact. Her jaw clenched. "I'm going to ask again: What are you doing here?"

"I..." His eyes, so much like Sakumo's searched hers. His shoulders fell. "Nothing."

Her eyes darted to her father's house. The old man may not be able to kill him himself any more, but he may very well be able to sway enough of their kinsman against the already unpopular child, especially if the truth of his shameful origin were revealed. "Well, don't come back here, and keep that mask up. If you let anyone know I brought you into this world, I swear, I will be the one to take you out of it."

She hurried back in the door, slamming it in his face before he could say anything else. Leaning against the red wood, tears streamed down her cheeks as her heart broke. "Fumi," it was Riichi, his voice thick with concern. "Darling, what's wrong?"

"Nothing," she lied. "Nothing. I just... I thought I saw a child out there in the storm."

He glanced out the window, but there was no one in sight. With a sympathetic smile, he grazed his thumb over his wife's cheek. "You're too tenderhearted for your own good."

Thirty-one Years Ago...

Fumi stood at the edge of her father's grave. Everyone else had left hours before, but she stood there fighting off the almost uncontrollable urge to throw things at the fresh turned earth. The tyrant that had ruined so much of her life was dead. She'd never gotten even with him. Fury tore through her at the thought that that man was buried a few yards away from Sakumo.

When she left, as the sun was dipping below the horizon, she saw him. A shock of silver hair peaking over the hitai-ate, his hands shoved down deep in his pockets. He was wearing the flak jacket of a jonin and she remembered that he was now an instructor. The last time she'd seen him, he was in ANBU, and she gave silent thanks that he had left alive.

There were a million things she wanted to say to him. "I'm sorry, please understand. The threat is gone now." No, that won't do.

He passed her without even glancing in her direction. She knew that she deserved much less. Through all the tragedy, he'd survived and he'd done it alone. She was not his mother. She was simply the woman who'd given birth to him.

Kakashi Hatake was a stronger man for not having had her in his life. This is what she thought as she turned back towards her house and her family.


	18. Chapter 18

Sakura woke before Kakashi, resisting the urge to stretch as she looked up at his face. When he was sleeping, he looked innocent. Even the angry scar over his eye didn't mar the image. His calloused fingers were still laced with hers, just like they'd been when they fell asleep. She hadn't meant to stay out so late, but there were things she'd had to get done for his party and things she had to do at her own house. There were also too many things on her mind.

She also hadn't expected him to be laying awake waiting for her. He'd propped himself up on his elbows as the bedroom door opened, wordlessly pushing back the sheets as she slid out of her clothes and joined him under the covers. "Sorry I'm late," she'd whispered against his neck as she kissed him.

He held her a little tighter. "You're here now, that's what matters," he said, just barely above a whisper.

Laying there, in the golden glow of dawn, she realized that she'd spent more nights in bed with this man than she had with her husband in the whole last five years of their married life. It was slightly unnerving. That night at The Broken Cup, she'd only meant to fuck him, to remind herself what it was to be with a man. She hadn't expected to fall in love with him, and she certainly hadn't expected him to fall in love with her.

"All I'm saying," her mother had said two days before, "is that you're rushing things."

Sakura gave her an exasperated glance as she'd unloaded the groceries she'd brought for her parents.

"Okay, and people are talking. He was your sensei, for goodness sake."

"Years ago, Mom," Sakura said with as much patience as she could muster. "And you're the only one talking. Everyone else is thrilled. Sarada. Ino. Dad."

"What was that, darling?" her father called from the sofa in the living room.

"I said you're happy Kakashi and I are together," Sakura said a bit louder.

He smiled. "My baby girl is happy, I'm happy."

Her mother leaned in closer and stage whispered. "Your father was happy when you and Sasuke got married too, and you see how that turned out."

"He died, Mom; he didn't leave me for his secretary," she said, accidentally denting a can of peas when she put it in the cabinet with a bit more force that necessary.

"All I'm saying is that you seem to attract damaged men."

"I thought all you were saying was that we were rushing things and that he was my sensei and that we had people talking."

Mrs. Haruno glared at her daughter.

"Will you at least be nice if you decide to come to his party?" Sakura asked.

"Nice? I'm always nice!"

"Sure you are, Mom," Sakura said with a long suffering sigh as she walked around and gave her mother a hug. "I really am happy."

For a moment it looked like her mother would argue, but she just sighed and gave Sakura a slightly strained smile. "I hope you stay really happy. That's the tricky bit."

Her parents had been happily married for almost fifty years. They'd been sweethearts growing up and had married fairly young. By the time Sakura came around 13 years later, they were the kind of couple that build the backbone of Konoha. When she'd first declared her undying love for Sasuke Uchiha, they'd thought it was a phase. All the girls were crazy about the brooding orphan with the tragic past, after all. As the years went on and the scars he left on her heart and body compounded but the devotion never faded, they had to admit that perhaps it was a bit of a character flaw within her.

If truth be told, Mrs. Haruno was a bit relieved with word came to the village that Sasuke had passed on; not that she hated her son-in-law or wished him ill, but his passing did provide her a glimmer of hope. Unfortunately it lasted only a few short weeks. Her dreams of setting her daughter up with some stable man were dashed when she'd admitted that the rumors around the village were true, she'd essentially moved in with her porn reading, philandering, cold-blooded assassin ex-sensei. It was almost too much for Mrs. Haruno.

Looking at the gentle pout on Kakashi's lips as he slept, though, Sakura knew that her mother would never understand this part of him. He had anti-social habits because that meant few people bothered getting close to him, which in turn meant there were fewer people to hurt him. He was a top notch assassin because he'd seen death so many times that it was now almost as commonplace as the sunrise for him.

Which was probably why he didn't seem to care that his mother was dying. It pricked Sakura's heart when she thought of it. His words the night before had been so calloused, but she knew he meant them. Although she couldn't imagine the woman being as cold as he described her, the bare facts were that Kakashi had grown up alone after his father killed himself. He was in none of the happy photos that hung on Fumi's walls. It must have been hard, growing up seeing her dote on the twins and ignore him.

But that was decades ago, another part of her mind reminded her. Surely after all those years he'd grown up to the point that he could forgive a dying woman.

Maybe Mom's right, she thought bitterly, maybe I do attract damaged men.

A faint, sleepy smile spread on his lips before his eyes opened. "Morning," he said, squeezing her fingers.

"Happy birthday," she said, with a smile she only halfway felt. Her fingers slid up his leg, the back of her hand grazing his cock. She started kissing at his neck, her teeth biting at his skin as she worked her way down. She used the pre-cum weeping from his head to lubricate her hand as she pumped him. No sooner had her lips taken in the head, though than he hissed, "I want to eat you out."

That could be arranged.

Deftly moving around without releasing his hardened shaft, she straddled his face, moaning as he sucked her pearl. Any apprehensions she'd been entertaining while he was sleeping were lost for the moment. Nothing on Earth compared to the feeling of his hungry mouth against her sex, lapping and sucking as though he'd been starved.

Her back arched as she sucked him harder, her tongue pressing against the sensitive head every time she reached his apex only to plunge him deep into her throat again a moment later. Her fingers slid down, pressing against his perineum, her chakra massaging his prostate. "Fuck," he moaned against her pussy as he grabbed her ass a little harder. She felt his cock expand in her mouth, the head becoming bulbous as it quivered. His nuts tightened. He was close, but he would hold out until she came. The longer she held out, the harder he would cum.

How she enjoyed their little game. She fought against the warm coil of pleasure that was pooling up inside her. His fingers found their way into her ass, pumping hard as he nipped at her pearl just before he began to suck it hard again. She could feel his cock seize in her mouth, but he didn't cum. He'd denied himself twice.

She pressed against his prostate milking it as his whole body began to tremble under her. The head of his cock barely fit into her throat anymore. He was moaning against her clit as he furiously ate her out. Once more his balls tightened and his cock throbbed. "Please, Sakura," he begged against her dripping pussy, "cum for me."

It was too much, her will shattered as pleasure flooded over her, her juices running down his neck as he drank her in. "I'm going to..." he gasped, his short nails digging in to the flesh of her ass as his seed rushed into her willing mouth. His whole body shook with pleasure. Rope after rope of salty, sweet nectar shot hard down her throat and she swallowed it all, relishing the noises he made as he came.

She carefully climbed off him, laying her head on his chest, smiling to herself at the delirious chuckle he gave as he raked his fingers through his hair. "That's probably the best birthday present I've ever gotten," he said.

"Oh, the day's not over," she said, tracing circles over his skin.

"That so?"

Propping herself up on her elbow, she leaned down and kissed his lips, tasting herself on him, heat pooling between her legs again when she realized that his tongue was relishing the taste of his seed in her mouth. Her fingers went to his cock and she felt it already hardening again. Sitting up, she straddled him, tucking the very tip of his cock against her wet entrance. "Do you want me to ride you, sensei?"

Maybe her mother was right, maybe they were depraved.

But as he thrust his hips upward, impaling her before she had the chance to tease him anymore, she didn't care. The world could have ended outside the walls of his bedroom and she would have not cared. The thing that mattered was the feeling of utter completion that she felt every time he filled her, and the desperate yearning that gripped her with his absence.

Her small breasts bounced up and down as she rode him, her hips swaying in time with and ancient rhythm. "You're so damned sexy," he said as his hands went up to pinch her nipples, causing her pussy to clamp down on his ever hardening cock.

"Tell me what to do, sensei," she purred. Yes, they were depraved.

"Faster," he said.

"Like this," she said as she picked up the tempo slightly.

His hips bucked, urging her rhythm faster. He pulled her towards him, his mouth claiming her right nipple as his hand assaulted the left. With every stroke she felt closer to cumming again. "I want you to fill me up," she groaned into his hair as his teeth gently bit at her tender nub.

"Patience is a virtue," he said. With a lightening fast series of hand signs, there was a small puff of air behind her and then she felt another set of arms wrap around her waist.

"Just relax," Kakashi's clone whispered into her ear. A moment later she felt another large cock pressing against the entrance of her ass. She hissed with pain and pleasure as the clone pushed his way into her.

"You did say 'fill me up,'" Kakashi said with a devilish grin.

It took no time at all for the three of them to find their rhythm. Kakashi hadn't expected the feeling of his clones cock through Sakura's thin wall would turn him on the way it did, but as their pace quickened and both cocks grew, he wasn't sure how much longer he could hold out. He tightened the chakra seal at the base of his cock, fighting against another orgasm. She had to cum first. He needed to feel her writhe with pleasure on him.

"Oh, god," his clone ground out in Sakura's ear.

The feeling of hot cum rushing into her was her undoing and she screamed out his name, her pussy spasming around Kakashi's cock so tightly that he could barely move. He broke the seal, a groan of pleasure catching in his throat as his seed flooded into her waiting womb. She collapsed onto his chest, the clone dissipating as she planted soft kisses on Kakashi's neck.

It was a good thing they didn't have anything to do until that evening, he thought as he cradled her against his chest. This was going to be the best birthday ever.


	19. Chapter 19

That night proved that Sakura's long running joke about all of Konoha fitting in Kakashi's house was only a slight exaggeration. Although Kakashi normally abhorred crowds, particularly ones that invaded his personal space, he found there was a wholly unexpected wonderfulness about having so many people show up just to wish him a happy birthday. The fact that Sakura spent almost the entire night by his side only made it that much sweeter.

"So," Anko had said as she leaned against the breakfast bar, "do I hear wedding bells in the future?"

Sakura instantly turned red, but Kakashi just laughed. "What, you want to be a bridesmaid?"

"Nah, but I'm sure Genma does." She nodded at said ninja.

Genma chuckled. "You're both just jealous that I look better than you in heels," he drawled.

"I'm not going to ask how you know that," Sakura said.

"Was a bet; whether me or Kakashi could make it across Konoha in heels first. I won," Genma added the last bit with a smirk.

"Not 100% sure that's really an accomplishment to be proud of," Sakura muttered, but Kakashi, Genma and Anko laughed.

"I only lost because Guy got in my way," Kakashi said as he wrapped his arms around Sakura's waist and rested his head on her shoulder. Guy had caught him halfway through the race and insisted on joining in, which cost Kakashi the few minutes it would have taken to beat Genma. It was a bittersweet memory, that brought a laugh to his throat, but a hollow feeling in his chest. He would have never guessed there would come a day where he'd miss Guy and his challenges.

He was only one of many who should have been there that night, but there was no sense in dwelling on it. Sakura put her hands over Kakashi's as she nuzzled her head against his. It was as if she'd read his mind.

"You guys are sickeningly sweet, you know that?" Anko rolled her eyes as she poured herself another glass of whiskey.

"Aw, you're just jealous," Genma purred in her ear as he mirrored Kakashi, wrapping his arms around Anko.

"You're both dorks," Anko grumbled.

But there was a faint smile on her lips as Genma released her, clapping her on the ass. "Come on, babe. We ought to get goin'. Happy birthday, Hatake."

"Thanks," he said, giving them a two fingered salute as they made their way through the crowd.

"So," Sakura whispered as they disappeared, "is Anko in love with Genma?"

Kakashi laughed. "No. They're good friends."

She turned around and looked at him skeptically. "Who fuck."

"Well, yeah. But as far as I know, Anko's not 'in love' with anybody."

"She told me she was."

He considered that for a moment. Neither Anko nor Genma cared for conventions. They balanced each other, but both of them were free about who they brought to their bedrooms. Maybe Sakura was right. He felt like a bit of an idiot for not having seen it before.

"I'm right," Sakura said with a triumphant smirk.

"If your job as a psychiatrist ever turns sour, you've got a promising future as a psychic."

"Mistress Sakura knows your innermost desires," she said in her best rendition of a mystical voice.

Under his mask a lopsided grin formed on Kakashi's lips as he leaned in and ran his hand over the small of her back. "Of that, I have no doubt."

OoO*OoO*OoO

With the crowd that had been gathered at his house, Sakura was surprised how quickly they were able to clean up after everyone left. They had great friends, she thought as she plopped herself down on the sofa beside Kakashi. "So, was it as bad as you thought it would be?"

"Worse," he said straight faced, but when she looked up at him, he smiled at her.

She chuckled as she reached up and pulled his mask down, kissing him. "I don't see why you wear that when it's just us at home," she whispered against his lush lips.

"Habit," he said, running his fingers through her hair. "I've been wearing one since I was three."

Her eyebrows knit together. "Three?"

He chuckled, but it was colder. "Surely you noticed that I look like my dear mother. Couldn't have people talking, could we?"

It was one of the saddest things she'd ever heard him say. As exasperating as her mother could be at times, she could not understand having one who'd inflicted such long lasting wounds on her. She'd seen a lot of children in her clinic who had abusive parents, ones who broke bones and scarred skin. But Kakashi's injuries weren't there for all the world to see. They were hidden behind a mask. One that told him he was something shameful.

It took every ounce of her strength not to let tears come to her eyes as she held him a little tighter. She made a silent vow that somehow before Fumi Inuzuka died she would do what she could to mend some of those wounds.

"Well," she said as they leaned back into the cushions, "I think you've got the most handsome face I've ever seen, and it's a pity the rest of the world isn't privy to it."

He laughed, more lighthearted this time. "What? Want to get rid of me so soon?"

She gave him a playful scowl. "No, I just want to gloat."

OoO*OoO*OoO

While the other children that they'd found with Masao had been placed into families and had began to answer to unique names, the first Chie that she encountered remained at the hospital. The girl, who testing determined was eight years old, refused to answer to anything but Chie, refused most meals, and attacked most adults who tried to make her do anything against her liking.

Sakura was the exception. With her, Chie was sometimes sullen, but not violent. So it fell on Sakura to take the girl out of the hospital on little day trips and try to get her acclimated to life in the village. About a week and a half after Kakashi's birthday, she decided to take Chie to the park.

Chie was never aggressive with children. On the contrary, she was fascinated with babies and almost painfully careful around children smaller than herself. Those her age and a bit older seemed to be regarded as equals and treated with respect. It wasn't until people became teenagers that they seemed to pose a threat to her.

"There will be a lot of parents with their children," Sakura reminded her softly as they walked hand in hand down the street.

Chie pulled Sasuke's cloak a bit tighter around her.

"If you get angry, you need to stay calm. Come talk to me. Okay?"

The girl nodded.

As the park came into view, Chie leaned a bit closer to her, holding her hand tighter.

Sakura leaned down. "Don't be scared," she said. "Look, there are lots of kids to play with."

Nodding, the girl seemed to try to pluck up her courage as she squared her shoulders.

"Be nice to the grown-ups, remember?"

"Yes, ma'am," Chie said softly.

Sakura couldn't help but smile as she watched Chie walk up to a smaller girl who was drawing with chalk on the sidewalk, her hands folded behind her back. "You draw pretty," Chie said, only the faintest hint of trepidation in her voice. It had taken weeks to convince her that not all drawings were bad. Her vocabulary, while still stunted, was growing too.

"Sakura-san!" a woman called out to her, and Sakura looked up to see Atsuko walking towards her. As she embraced her Atsuko said, "I didn't expect to see you here today."

She had the same smile Kakashi did.

"I'm here a friend," Sakura said, half a lie. "Are you here with your kids?"

"Oh, no. My children are too old to be here. I brought my granddaughter." She pointed towards a little girl in pigtails swinging on the monkey bars.

"You're too young to have grandchildren!"

Atsuko threw back her head and laughed. "I'm forty-seven! My baby is sixteen. This is my oldest daughter's daughter. But you made my day."

Sakura's cell phone rang with a text alert. Kakashi: Do you have any plans for tonight?

"Excuse me a minute," she said to Atsuko before she hurriedly typed, Are you back from your mission?

A moment later she got another message, Yes and I miss you.

Come meet me at the park. Send.

"You look like a woman in love," Atsuko said with a sly smile as Sakura tucked her phone back in her purse.

"I am," Sakura said with a faint blush rising to her cheeks.

Chie was swinging as they chatted, keeping an eye on their children. Sakura said a silent prayer that Kakashi would not be mad at her for this. A few minutes later, when he walked around the bench they were sitting on and spotted Atsuko his smile faltered for a moment.

She stood, flustered, bowing low. "Rokudaime-sama," she said. "It's such an honor."

He gave a single chuckle as he bowed back. "Just plain Kakashi's fine," he said with a smile Sakura knew was fake.

"Kakashi," Sakura said, trying to keep her voice even. "This is my friend, Atsuko Inuzuka. Atsuko, this is my boyfriend, Kakashi."

"It's a pleasure to meet you," he said, his face unreadable.

Atsuko's granddaughter ran up to her. "Granny, can we go get snowballs when we leave?" Suddenly realizing who she was in the presence of, the little girl quickly bowed just like her grandmother had. "Rokudaime-sama!"

Kakashi bowed back to the little girl. "You want to know a secret?" he said with a conspiratorial whisper.

The girl nodded eagerly.

"I don't like all that formal stuff. You can just call me Kakashi."

"Really?!" she asked, her eyes glowing with admiration.

"Really," he said, patting her on the head.

She gave a squeal and ran off back to the playground.

"She's a cute kid," Kakashi said to Atsuko with a genuine smile.

"She's a handful," Atsuko said, relaxing slightly. "But let me let you two visit. It was very nice to meet you, Rokuda..." But Kakashi held up a finger and she chuckled, "I'm sorry, Kakashi-san."

"Getting better," he said. "See you around, Atsuko."

Sakura hadn't expected it to feel like she'd lost a safety net as Atsuko left, but it did. Kakashi's eyes were on Chie and he was silent as the minutes drug on. "You texted me right after I ran into her," Sakura began to explain.

"And you thought I needed to meet her," he said flatly without turning to her.

"Well, yes."

"Hmm. Did that satisfy whatever psychiatric urges you had?"

"I'm not treating you like a patient, Kakashi," she said softly.

"Really?"

"Yes."

He nodded, taking a deep breath. Nodding to Chie, he said, "She seems to be doing better. Any leads on a family?"

"Not yet," Sakura said. "She still has a lot of issues to work through."

"A family would help that."

"Yes, they would." She wasn't sure if he felt the weight of his own words.


	20. Chapter 20

****

Sakura walked into the dim room. "I was right, wasn't I?" Fumi asked as Sakura sat in the seat opposite her.

"He's away on a mission today," Sakura said, dodging the question.

Fumi gave a mirthless chuckle. "He won't come to see me, and that's okay." Her eyes were more hollow than they'd been the week before, breathing a bit more ragged. Lung Rot. An ugly name for an ugly disease that plagued many of the clans. It started with a nagging cough, but gradually the lungs broke down. While medical treatment could slow it down, no amount of skill could halt its progress.

"You hurt him," Sakura said softly as she reached out and took Fumi's frail hand in her own.

"I know." Regret was plainly written on her face.

"You should at least tell your other children. That way, even if you die before he forgives you, he'll still have a family that know about him."

Tears welled in Fumi's eyes, but she nodded. "I have thought that for a long time, but I didn't know how to tell them."

Sakura gently squeezed her fingers. "If you need help, I'm here for you."

"I'm glad he's with you." Fumi's eyes had that far away look again.

There was a soft knock on the door and a moment later, Asahi opened the door a crack. "Is it okay if we come in?" he asked. "We brought tea."

"Yes, dear," Fumi called out to him.

The door opened wider, and the little boy from Sarada's team came in, holding a tray of tea, followed by Asahi. "Sakura, you know my son, and this is his youngest, Haruto."

"It's nice to meet you, Haruto-kun. You're on my daughter, Sarada's team. Yes?" Sakura said.

"Yes, ma'am," Haruto said, a faint blush rising to his cheeks.

"Atsuko told me to let you know that she'll only be an hour or so. Haruto and I will be downstairs if you need us," Asahi said, just before he leaned down and kissed the top of his mother's head. He was only a little taller than Sakura, with a broad face, soft voice and quick smile. "It was nice seeing you again, Sakura-san." And then he led his son out the room.

"He reminds me so much of his father," Fumi said when the door closed. "Riichi was kind man. He never raised a hand in anger to me, but he never knew the truth. It would have broken him, and he didn't deserve that." She gave Sakura a sad smile. "I suppose you think I'm a wretched person, having the happiness I found after all I did to Sakumo and Kakashi."

Sakura shook her head. "No," she said honestly. "I think we all look for joy and take it where we can."

"They'll hate me when they find out the truth." A tear rolled down Fumi's cheeks.

"No," Sakura said with full confidence. "I don't think they could ever hate you." Nothing she'd seen from the twins showed anything but love and devotion to their mother, who had obviously doted on them their whole lives. They were as tight-knit a family as any she'd ever seen in Konoha, and Sakura had no doubt that even such a scandal could truly break it apart.

OoO*OoO*OoO

That night Sakura slept on the sofa at her house. It was strange, being there, and it had taken her a few hours to finally drift off. She'd just gotten to sleep properly when her cell phone rang. Hospital. Not Children's Clinic. Groaning, she slid it unlocked and brought it to her ear. "Director Uchiha."

"Sorry to wake you ma'am, but we need you down here stat."

"I'm on my way," she said, pushing herself off the sofa as she hit end on the phone. It would be a long night, she thought as she tried to rouse herself fully and dress quickly.

It was just passed midnight, the streets decidedly empty. She ran, the trickle of adrenaline slowly pushing sleep and fatigue away. If she was still tired when she got there and it proved to really be an emergency, she told herself, she'd take half a soldier pill. It was better than coffee.

She pushed open the doors to the emergency room where she'd first learned medical jutsu, rolling up her sleeves as she walked. "What do we have?" she asked the nurse behind the desk, who hurriedly walked beside her.

"Male, 51," Sakura's heart dropped, "brought in about a half hour ago with a severed arm. Severe blood loss."

Sakura snatched the folder from her. Kakashi. She cursed under her breath as she picked up the pace to the operating room. He was unconscious, the medics working to keep the limb alive and him from bleeding out. Her breath caught in her throat, but she forced the feelings away. If he was going to make it, she needed to have her head about her.

Reattaching limbs was a tricky bit of work. There were microscopic nerves and veins that had to be pieced back together exactly, and the whole while she was doing that, other medics had to keep both the limb and the patient from dying. It took two hours for her to finish.

When she was done, he was breathing a bit better, although he was still unconscious. She leaned against the bed as the other medics left to get cleaned up, her gaze went to the blood on her hands, on the bed, on the floor. "You asshole," she whispered as the tears stung her eyes. He had no business taking the kind of missions he did at his age. Hell, even Anko had resigned herself to teaching at the Academy. The only three of his age that had been active in the last five years were him, Genma, and Guy, and Guy had been killed two years before.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi woke to the smell of lilacs. His body ached as he opened his eyes and saw Sakura slouched in a chair, her head rested on the edge of his hospital bed. His good hand went up to her hair, running his fingers through it.

When she looked up, her eyes were red and puffy. Damn it, she'd been crying. "I'm sorry," he said softly.

"You could have died," she sniffed.

"Could have died a thousand times before tonight, too," he said with a chuckle.

"It's not funny!"

"I know."

She bit her lip, and he could see the conflict raging in her eyes. This wasn't something he'd expected. Sakura had grown up in the shinobi life; she'd been married to a man who was gone for years at a time on dangerous missions. Surely if anyone could understand the sacrifices he made, it was her. But looking at her, he began to think that maybe she couldn't.

"I want you to quit," she said, barely audibly.

"And do what, exactly?" He forced his voice to sound nonchalant.

"Anything else. There are lots of jobs at headquarters."

He scoffed. "Desk work? That doesn't suit me and you know it."

"Then retire," she snapped. "You almost died tonight. You almost died fighting Masao. Is that what you really want? To die?!"

For decades it had been. He'd chased death. Invited it in like a friend. But the truth was, for the first time in forever he felt like he really had something to live for now. His gaze softened slightly as he pulled her to his chest. "No, that's not what I want," he said and he felt her relax slightly as she climbed into the bed beside him. "But fighting is the only thing I've ever been good for; without it, I'm of no use at all."

She looked up at him, disbelief plainly written on her face.

 _If only she knew,_  he thought.

"You have been the best thing in my life," she said softly as she reached up and kissed his lips. "The best thing in Sarada's life. We need you."

Her words caused his chest to ache as he held her closer. This woman was what he'd spent his whole life searching for. She knit together all the broken pieces of him, and he started to think that maybe, just maybe, this heaven was going to last. "I'll think about it," he said as his hand slid over her back. He would. If it were between purpose and her, he would choose her. He knew himself that well.

OoO*OoO*OoO

He wasn't supposed to have left the hospital three days after he'd arrived, but what was the point of being an elite shinobi if you couldn't at least sneak past a hospital full of medics. Sakura was back at her job, and he hated hospitals. When he walked into Naruto's office, the blonde's eyes went wide. "You're supposed to be resting!"

"It's so sweet of you to worry about your old sensei, but I actually needed to talk to you about something important." Kakashi lay a letter on the desk. "I'm turning in my resignation."

The hokage's jaw dropped for a moment, but he recovered quickly. "What brought this on?"

There was a twinkle in Kakashi's eyes as he said, "I have a feeling you'll know in a few days."


	21. Chapter 21

Kakashi shifted the weight on his feet as he waited for the door to open. It felt like he couldn't draw a full breath. When the door opened he almost jumped. "Kakashi!" Mr. Haruno said brightly. The man's pink-tinted gray hair stuck out wildly, combined with the wide smile, it gave him a slightly loopy look. He pulled Kakashi into the house. "Come in, come in. How's my Sakura?"

"She's good, a bit overworked maybe, but good."

"I'm glad," Mr. Haruno said. "Let me get you something to drink. Tea? Coffee? Whiskey?" The last was added with a sly, knowing smile and Mr. Haruno had went to the cabinet, his hand on the glasses and bottle.

"Thanks," Kakashi said, a nervous smile on his lips as he accepted the glass and sipped it through the mask.

"Got yourself banged up again, I see." He nodded to Kakashi's arm that was still in a sling. "Sure Sakura gave you an ear full for that one. Just like her mother, that one. Don't tell her I said that." Mr. Haruno drained his glass and filled it up again. "So what brings you here this morning?"

"Well...I actually..." He drew a deep breath. "I wanted to speak to you and your wife together."

"Ah, Mebuki should be home soon," Mr. Haruno said with a smile.

They sat and talked, sipping whiskey as they waited. Mr. Haruno told him the tale of the time he worked alongside Sakumo when he was a new genin. "The White Fang of the Leaf, and there I am shaking like a leaf," Mr. Haruno laughed, clapping Kakashi on the shoulder. "I was so worried I'd screw something up I wound up breaking the vase we were supposed to be smuggling out the dignitary's house. Your dad, though, he told the guys in forensics he'd dropped it. Good man, your dad. Real good man."

The front door opened. "You won't believe who I ran into in the market," Mrs. Haruno started, but as she walked into the kitchen and saw Kakashi, her genuine smile faltered, replaced with a polite one. "Oh, you're here. How're you?"

"Well, thank you," Kakashi said, pushing down the fears that swelled again. "How have you been?"

"Fine, fine," Mrs. Haruno said as she sat the bag of groceries down on the table. "What brings you here today?"

"I actually... wanted to talk to you about Sakura and my relationship." He forced himself to hold Mrs. Haruno's gaze which sharpened slightly at his words. "She means a great deal to me, and I... I would like your permission to ask her to..." he fumbled with the box in his pocket and pulled it out, "marry her." He opened the small wooden box revealing a delicate silver band that looked like a cherry branch, each blossom held a diamond in its heart.

"If that isn't the prettiest thing," Mr. Haruno said with a smile. "She's going to love it. Of course you have our blessing."

Mrs. Haruno's eyes, though, grew colder. She said nothing as she stood up and went to the stove, turning on the kettle.

"I know it's very soon after we learned about Sasuke's passing," Kakashi said, watching her back as his palms began to sweat.

"Yes, it is," she said without turning. "Not that that's stopped either of you yet, has it?"

"Mebuki!" Mr. Haruno warned.

She turned, her teal eyes just short of a glare. "How can you give him your blessing? He was her sensei, for crying out loud! And if the rumors are true he's slept with 75% of Konoha's female population and a good portion of the males as well! Disgusting. People don't change overnight! Sakura deserves better than some philandering pig."

Kakashi's heart fell with each word she uttered. He shoved the box deep in his pocket.  _This was a mistake. It was all a mistake._

He barely registered Mr. Haruno saying, "He was also Hokage and has been good to Sakura and Sarada over the years; did you forget that?!"

Rising from the chair he'd been sitting on, Kakashi said. "Thank you for your time and for the drinks, Mr. Haruno. Mrs. Haruno," he bowed. "Have a nice day."

Mr. Haruno said something, trying to get him to stay, but it was lost on him as he walked blindly out the house, the two of them bickering in his wake. Even though the sunlight was unrelenting, it felt like he was walking in darkness. She'd been right. Sakura did deserve better. He'd known it from the beginning. She deserved someone like Iruka or maybe even Tenzo, someone pure. For the life of him he couldn't understand why he'd ever thought he was good enough to marry her.

His feet led him to The Broken Cup, more out of habit than anything else. He sat at the edge of the bar, wishing he'd not held true to his word to Sakura about leaving Icha Icha at home. It was an excellent way to avoid people in public. Luckily, though, the bartender was not talkative and he had several hours before the evening crowd came in to bother him.

OoO*OoO*OoO

At around six, Anko came in, her eyes scanning the bar before they fell on Kakashi. It had been weeks since he was there, months since he'd been as shitfaced as he appeared to be. "What the fuck did she do?" she said as she slid into the seat beside him.

He turned to her slowly, his eyes taking a moment to focus. "She? She didn't want a fuckin' whore marryin' her daughter. Can't say's how I blame her, really. If... If I had a little girl, I wouldn't want her marryin' someone like me."

"Okay, I think you've had enough," she said, plucking the glass from his hand and pushing it towards the bartender.

"Hey, I wasn' done with that," he said, reaching for it.

"Come on, Hatake. Let's you and me take a little walk," Anko said, putting her arm under his shoulder and guiding him to his feet. "You know you shouldn't be drinking with that medicine you're on. Sakura's going kill you."

He gave a mirthless chuckle. "I resigned for her," he said. "Got me a job lined up in investigations. Isn' that some shit?"

"Maybe you can talk Genma into resigning too," Anko said almost to herself as she led him out into the cold night air. "Raido's been after him to do it for years."

"Where're we goin'?" He pointed his finger up one side of the street and down the other.

"Get you some coffee," she said.

"Bu' I don' want coffee."

"Okay, what do you want?"

He gave her a lopsided grin before he leaned his head against hers. "Let's go back to your place."

"Okay, that's a monumentally bad idea," she said, pulling away from him a bit.

"Aw, I know you're in love with Genma and shit. Sakura tol' me." He chuckled. "But he won' mind."

Anko stopped so short that Kakashi stumbled. She grabbed both his shoulders, glaring at him for a moment before she slapped him hard on the cheek.

"Ow, what the fuck?!" he said, holding the cheek.

"Yeah, what the fuck?!" she growled at him. "Are you a complete idiot? You love this girl so much you want to marry her, but one little road bump and you're drunk off your ass, asking me to fuck you. You're  _pathetic_!"

His eyes went wide for the briefest moment and she knew something she'd said had hit home.  _Good_ , she thought,  _he needs a damned wake-up call._

He shoved his good hand into his pocket and turned from her, walking down the street.

"Where are you going?" she called after him.

He gave a non-committal wave and kept walking.

OoO*OoO*OoO

He passed up The Broken Cup and made his way to the graveyard. By all counts he should have been there a long time ago, nothing more than a slab of marble and a name. When he got to Rin's grave he hit his knees, his fingers running through the thick grass. If he hadn't killed her, what would have she said. Probably about the same thing Anko just did. Pathetic, that's what he was.

It was about an hour before a male voice behind him said, "Come on, Hatake."

"Get lost, Shiranui."

Genma chuckled as he put his hand on Kakashi's shoulder. "Anko's worried about you."

"I'm not gonna kill anybody."

"I'd be real surprised if you could see well enough to piss straight right now, let alone kill anybody. Come on, let's get you sobered up."

"Why?"

"Cause Sakura's already been to The Broken Cup looking for you and we all lied to cover your ass."

"I need to break things off with her," Kakashi said, almost to himself.

Genma grabbed Kakashi under the arms and lifted him to his feet. "There ya go," he said, steadying Kakashi. "No talking to Sakura right now. In fact, no talking to anyone right now. Shit you even got me in trouble with Anko, running your mouth."

"Sorry," Kakashi muttered.

"You really resign?"

"Yup."

"Ain't that some shit," Genma muttered. "Now she wants me to hang up my jacket. Maybe it's for the best; can't stand all these young fucks anyway."

"You oughta marry her."

"Now see that's exactly why you shouldn't be talkin' to anyone, and I mean  _anyone,_  right now."

"I asked to go back to her place tonight and she turned me down."

"Probably cause drunk sex is only fun if you're the one plastered."

"Nah, it's cause she's in love with you."

Genma steered them into a cafe and sat Kakashi down in a booth before going to the counter and ordering a carafe of the strongest coffee they had. He came back a few minutes later and slid a mug in front of his friend, pouring a steaming cup for each of them. "So you really planning to ask Sakura to marry you?"

"Not any more," Kakashi said. He took the ring box out his pocket and slid it towards Genma. "Maybe you can give it to Anko."

Genma rolled his eyes, plucking up the box and opening it. "Yeah, not Anko's style by a long shot. So why the change of plans?"

"Her mom hates me."

"So the fuck what? She's a widow for fuck's sake. You want to ask somebody, ask that little girl you helped raise. Cause you know as well as me that it wasn't Sasuke there doing daddy duty most years. Ask her; I bet you she'll be damned tickled to have you and her mama official."

"You think?"

Sliding the box back to Kakashi, Genma gave him a lopsided grin. "Sure. But it ain't gonna work if you go around gettin' shit faced and screwin' around. Sakura's not that type of girl." He poured Kakashi a second cup of coffee.

"What'd ya tell Sakura I was doing, anyway?"

Genma shrugged. "Told her I hadn't seen you, cause that was the truth. I think Anko told her you were getting things lined up in Investigations, but I doubt she'd go all the way there looking for you. She's probably at home waiting." He chuckled as he shook his head. "Damn we're getting old. You fuckin' jinxed us all, you bastard."

"I wouldn't have fucked her," Kakashi said as he set the empty cup down.

"Anko? Yeah, I know. Sakura's got you wrapped."

Kakashi smiled down at the cup in his hands. "She does."

"I'm happy for you, man. If anybody deserves it, you do." Genma poured Kakashi another cup of coffee, gesturing to a passing waitress to refill the carafe. "But I'm serious when I say, ask Sarada. She's a better judge of the situation that Sakura's parents." He chuckled. "Anko's right, you're one dorky mother-fucker."

Kakashi scoffed as he sipped the coffee. He ran his finger over the edge of the box. When he'd picked it out two days before, he'd had a lot of high hopes. Maybe too high. He'd meant to do things right. At least her dad seemed happy at the prospect. Maybe that was all he could hope for. Life wasn't a fairy tale, after all.

"Thanks for this, Shiranui"

"Don't mention it."


	22. Chapter 22

Sakura was sitting on the living room sofa reading when Kakashi walked into the house. She noticed the slight stagger to his steps as he locked the door behind himself.  _Ninjas_ , her inner voice scoffed. S _hould have known better than to believe those guys at the bar._

He may have fumbled getting his sandals off, but he wasn't drunk enough not to notice her sitting there, and he rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly as he leaned against the entrance to the living room. "Sorry I kept you waitin'," he said, his words still slightly slurring.

"Getting things lined up in Investigations?" she asked, resisting the urge to cock an eyebrow.

"Went to The Broken Cup."

At least he was honest. She nodded. "I figured." Standing up, she popped her back.

"You mad?"

"Nope," she said with a knowing smile. "We all have those kinds of days." She walked up to him, but his gaze was down at the floor. "Don't be mad at yourself either, k? Come on to bed." Her warm fingers ran up his jawline before she slid down his mask. Tiptoeing she brought her lips to his. His mouth tasted of whiskey, and his clothes smelled of a cologne that wasn't his.  _A leopard can't change his spots_ , her mother'd warned her.

She led him to his bedroom that was quickly feeling like theirs, but when she started to undress him, he suddenly pulled away. "I need a shower," he said backing away to the bathroom. His gaze didn't meet hers again. There was no invitation there.

"Okay," she drew out as the door closed behind him. With a huff she lay down on the bed, her mind ticking off the days on the calendar. No morbid anniversary lined up.  _He's probably just miserable because I convinced him to quit,_  she thought as she ran her fingers through her hair.  _He's the best of the best, after all, second only to the sannin and maybe the jinchurikis._  (The last of which, in her opinion, wasn't a fair comparison.)

 _But_ , she thought, even Jiraiya, for all his power,  _died at 54_. It was the fate of any ninja who stayed active. She just couldn't lose another man that she loved. Apparently not even if he was someone who'd fuck around on her, her threat to kill him falling harmless to the ground. Her heart couldn't take losing him, even if it meant making him miserable. That was selfish. Or maybe it was compromise.

When Kakashi came back out, wrapped only in a towel as he used a smaller one to dry his hair, she smiled at him. "Feel better?"

"Yeah," he said as he let the towel drop to the floor and lay down beside her. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," she lied smoothly as she ran her fingers through his damp hair that hung in front of his eyes. "Your cheek's bruised."

"Ran into a post," he said.

Her eyebrows shot up right before she burst out laughing.

"I'm glad my pain amuses you," he said flatly, but a second later a faint smile graced his lips. "I like hearing you laugh."

She hummed as she ran her fingertips over his chest. "I like hearing you moan."

He gave her a look of mock horror. "Must you pervert everything?"

Her hand went to his cock and she wrapped her fingers around it, relishing the hiss that escaped his lips. "You say that, but I'm fully clothed and you're buck naked." She'd watched him play this game. It had to not mean anything. Sex. Love was something else. Separated. Maybe one day she'd wind up sleeping around too, just so long as they knew at the end of the day it was them. Kind of like Genma and Anko.

She flipped him onto his back, standing up over him as she striped slowly, her eyes watching his as his desire grew. "I've been experimenting with something," she said with a sly smile as she put a genjutsu on him and suddenly it seemed to him that there were two of her. She may not be able to make shadow clones, but she'd learned to manipulate the human mind better than almost anyone in the village. Anything that could bring pain could bring pleasure if used correctly, after all.

"So damned hot," she heard Kakashi whisper as slid onto his shaft, the fake Sakura in his mind climbing onto his mouth. Maybe she wasn't enough for him, but she wasn't going down without a fight. Her nails raked over his chest as he quaked under her. She filled his mind with things she'd seen in the porn she'd watched over the years to fill Sasuke's absence. He ground out her name as he came hard and she wondered exactly who's name he'd been calling earlier that night.  _Not that it matters,_ she reminded herself.

When he fell asleep, his head cradled on her chest, she gently stroked his hair.  _What's wrong with me? Would it be so awful to have something healthy? Someone without issues?_  She bit back a scoff.  _Who the hell in the village didn't have at least a few issues?_

OoO*OoO*OoO

The next morning, Kakashi reported for duty at the Investigations Division. It wasn't as if he'd never been there before, but now he seemed to see it with new eyes. The tired looking receptionist who asked for his badge even though she knew very well who he was. The poorly lit pool of desk lined up like battle weary soldiers in the central office. The smell of stale coffee and dumplings rather than steel and blood. It all made his skin crawl.

"Kakashi," Raido greeted him with a firm handshake. "Good to have you here. Come on, I'll show you to your office." The shock must have shown up in Kakashi's eyes, because Raido gave a single chuckle and added, "They're not going to relegate the Rokudaime to the pool. Everybody here knows your skill set."

He pushed open the door to a well lit, if small, office and pointed to the stack of paperwork already on the desk. "You've got four cases on you so far. Biggest one is an assassination attempt on the Hokage. Here's your key to the evidence locker and your security pass. We've got a briefing at nine, I know you're... um, habitually late, but I'd give it a few months before you pull that here."

Raido left him there, the faint office noise coming through the crack in the door. Kakashi drew a deep breath. When he'd accepted the job as Hokage, he'd not expected to stay in it for thirteen years. He had a sinking feeling that this job would last much longer. His fingers inadvertently went to the tiny box in his pocket, though. Definitely worth it.

OoO*OoO*OoO

" _You're_  buying me lunch?" Sarada tilted her chin down, studying Kakashi as if he'd suddenly claimed to be a unicorn.

"I've bought you lunch plenty of times," he said indignantly.

"When I was six." Sarada chuckled.

"I beg your pardon, I didn't start letting you pay until you made chunnin, so let's double that." He couldn't help smiling, though. Spoiled little thing.

"And then I paid for both of us. For years."

"Five years, how dreadful," he drawled. "Barbecue or sushi?"

"Mmm, barbecue, definitely. So what's the occasion? That glad about a civilian job?"

"You could say that," he said as he held the door open for her.

They ate and talked away a half hour before Kakashi finally said, "I've actually got something important to ask you."

"Yes," she said as she dabbed the corners of her lips.

"I'd like to ask your mom to marry me," he said, pulling the ring box out his pocket.

Sarada giggled. "I already said 'yes.'  _Yes_ , ask her."

"You knew what..." he started.

"... you were going to ask?  _Yes_. You're paying for lunch. Either the world's about to end  _or_  you've got a pretty big announcement, and it's not like you'd ask me if you two were having a kid or something."

He choked.

"Are you having a kid too?!" Her eyes lit up. "I've always wanted a little brother!"

"Um, no. Not yet, anyway. I don't think." His brows knit. Sakura had been acting weird that morning before she left for work, but he had no experience in that department.

"Okay, but you'd better make this special. I mean, do you know how my dad asked her to marry him?" Her eyebrows were arched as she looked at him pointedly.

"Err, no."

"Well, she'd just told him she was pregnant for me and he said, 'We should get married.'" Sarada rolled her eyes. "Like, 'We should remodel the kitchen,' or 'We should switch phone companies.' I mean, I love him, but Mom needs a bit of romance in her life.  _Do_   _not_  botch this up." She plucked the box out of his hand and opened it, her eyes going wide as her breath caught. "This. Is. Perfect! You're a genius!"

"You really think she'll like it?"

"Like it? She's going to adore this." Sarada gave a contented sigh as she gazed back at the delicate ring. "You know, if you were anyone else, I wouldn't be giving you the go ahead, but you always belonged in this family." Looking up at him, she gave him a lopsided grin. "I actually thought you were my dad for a while."

"Because we look so much alike," he smirked, but her words touched his heart.

"Yeah, undeniable family resemblance." She took a napkin and held it over the lower half of her face, letting her eyelids grow heavy.

"I don't know why I didn't see it before," he said, leaning over and ruffling her hair, causing a squeal of mock disapproval from her before she straightened her hair again.

"So when are you going to ask her?"

"I'm not sure," he said with a faint blush. "It'll be special, though. That's why I wanted to do this right. Well, first I actually asked her parents."

Sarada gave a snorting laugh. "Let me guess. Gramps is over the moon, and Gran hates the idea."

"Well, yeah," he said slightly unnerved.

She waved it off, though. "Don't worry about her; she'll come around. Mom says she'd been trying to set up her and Shikamaru-san right up until the time he and Temari-san got married; god knows who she'd want her marrying now."

"Shikamaru?"

"Yeah," Sarada drew out. "Your guess is as good as mine. I mean, at least you're not a smoker."

"In all fairness, he picked that up after his Sensei died."

"That's still a couple decades. Ick. Anyway," she folded her napkin. "I'd better get back to my class. Thanks for the lunch." She stood up and walked around the table, dropping a kiss on top his silver hair. "See you around, Dad." And with a puff of smoke, she was gone.

As he pulled the money out his wallet and laid it on top of the bill he smiled to himself. Dad. He liked the sound of that.  _I'm sorry, Sasuke; I don't mean any disrespect. I'll take care of your little girl,_ he promised as he got up and walked out onto the sunny street.


	23. Chapter 23

Sakura had just left for work and Kakashi was locking the door when he heard the garden gate open and turned to see Atsuko hurrying down towards him, her arms wrapped around her and her face tense.  _She knows. Damn it all._ Feigning ignorance he smiled, "Why, Atsuko, what brings you here today?"

She stopped short, biting her bottom lip before the words spilled out of her mouth, more nervous than anything else, "Mother's dying. You need to come see her."

He took his sister's hand in his and pat the top of it. "I'm sorry your mother's passing away, but I really don't see what I can do." And then he went to walk around her.

"She's your mother too!" It was sharp and pleading and Kakashi could smell the tears welling in her eyes without even turning towards her.

"No, she's not," he said as patiently as he could muster. "There's nothing I can do."

"You can be there!" Atsuko pleaded as she followed him through the gate. "You can forgive her. She's so sorry. Please."

"I forgive her," he said. If for no other reason than to ease the aching rage that smoldered in his chest, he would attempt to make that true.

"She's only got a day or so more. Maybe not even that. It would put her at peace to hear it from you."

"We all have to find our own peace."

Atsuko's feet halted, her breath catching and for a moment he thought that maybe she understood. But then she called out to him, "Don't you have even a shred of compassion in you!? She brought you into this world!"

 _And left me for the wolves,_ he thought, but his feet kept walking.

His mind was still reeling as he went into his office, trying to push aside the sound of his sister's voice ringing in his ears. Opening the file on the assassination attempt, he laid the papers over the desk trying to find the patterns. His mind kept going back to Atsuko, though. Fumi was dying, so what?

There was a sharp rap on the door and as soon as he said, "Come in," Raido opened it with a stack of photos. "These may help," he said, laying them on a free corner. "Making any headway."

"Trying to," Kakashi said with a groan as he pushed his hair back.

Raido studied him. "What'd you bring to work?"

"Nothing," Kakashi half-lied. "Just found out I've got a family member dying."

"I didn't think you had any family left. You need off?"

Kakashi scoffed. "Nah, the world's not losing anything special."

Raido's eyes narrowed slightly. "You remember my old man?"

_It would have been hard to forget Raido's father. The Namiashi family lived two houses down from Kakashi and his dad. Mr. Namiashi was prone to fits of drunken rage, and one of Kakashi's first memories of the man happened right before they'd joined the Academy. Raido had been about six and Kakashi was four. Sakumo and Kakashi had been about to go to bed when there was a banging on the door. Mrs. Namiashi was there, bloodied lip and tear streaked face as she frantically pulled Sakumo out the house, crying, "He's going to kill him! Please! Please! You've got to stop him!"_

_Sakumo had ordered Kakashi to stay in the house and when he returned hours later he would say nothing more than that Mr. Namiashi wouldn't be around for a while. The next day Raido had a bandage over his face covering the angry burns that he tried to hide all through his childhood._

"Yeah, I remember him," was all Kakashi said. 

"I got a call three years back. His liver was failing, big surprise. My wife tried to convince me to go see him and make amends. I didn't even go to the funeral." He shook his head and scoffed. "It's one of the biggest regrets I've got in life. Whoever this person is, it meant enough to keep your mind off your work. I know you, that takes a lot. Take the rest of the day off. Say whatever it is you need to them. Make peace before it's too late."

Kakashi pinched the bridge of his nose, then picked up some of the papers. "This is more important than some long lost family member, dying or not."

"Whatever you say," Raido said. "If you want to take off, though, just ask."

OoO*OoO*OoO

It was raining when Kakashi left the office. He walked through the crowded streets, the hood of his black oil-cloth cloak pulled low over his eyes. He should have just gone home, but Raido's words had been playing with Atsuko's all day. He'd been the one to find his father, his tanto plunged into his abdomen. There hadn't been any parting words, no closure at all except the crushing silence and the realization that he was completely alone in the world.

Part of him wanted to go get Sakura. It would be easier with her by his side, acting as a buffer against this, but that wasn't fair to her. This was between him and Fumi Inuzuka.

He stood on that step in front of the red door, rain pouring all around the narrow awning like a waterfall, and he was a thirteen-years-old boy again. He raised his hand and knocked. Minutes passed. He was about to turn when he heard footsteps in the house. He'd half expected it to be Fumi opening the door again, but he realized just before it opened how stupid that was. The woman was dying.

It was Atsuko at the door and as soon as she realized it was Kakashi, her eyes welled with tears. Before he could say anything she stepped forward, wrapping her arms around him, not caring that his cloak was soaking moisture into her clothes. "Am I too late?" his voice sounded so hollow.

She pulled away a bit, wiping her eyes with one hand, the other one firmly holding onto his arm as if he'd run away if she let him go. She smiled as she sniffled, "No, no, she's still here. I'm just... I'm so sorry. That was awful what I said this morning."

His lips pursed in a half-smiled. "Nothing to apologize for. I was a jerk."

"It runs in the family. Come in, come in." She pulled him inside the warm, cheery house. Taking the cloak from him, she said, "Let me get this from you. Everyone else is upstairs."

Kakashi's eyes roved over every inch of the house he could see. There was a set of four little flowerpots on the kitchen windowsill, each with different herbs. There was a fireplace in the living room. Photos lined the hallway that led to the stairs. Birthdays. Graduations. Weddings. Babies. He recognized them. How often as a boy had he hidden in the shadows watching Fumi playing with her twins. They seemed to live in a magical bubble that he would burst if he got too close to it. Even now if felt like he were threatening it.

He followed Atsuko upstairs feeling as if he were in a dream or a nightmare. She opened the door to bedroom. Asahi was sitting in a chair beside Fumi, holding her hand as he talked to her in a soft voice. There were several younger people standing around that Kakashi assumed were her grandchildren. Asahi looked up, a knowing smile as he said one last thing to his mother then pat her hand and stood. Walking to Kakashi he held out his hand, "Mama told us about you. It's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Asahi."

"I know," Kakashi said, not unkindly. "Nice to meet you too."

"Let's give them a little time," Atsuko whispered to her twin brother, gesturing for the others to leave the room too.

Fumi was so thin that Kakashi wouldn't have recognized her. Her breath rattled in her chest. The only color on her at all were the bloodstains on her lips; as her gaze met his they curved into a sad smile, tears pooling in her eyes. And suddenly Fumi Inuzuka wasn't the monster he'd remembered her being. She was a broken old woman weighed down with decades of regret.

"Hi," Kakashi said as he sat down in the seat beside the bed.

"Hi," she said as she reached out her cold hand and slid it into his warm one. "I... am... sorry." Each word was barely a whisper, but it took as full a breath as she could draw to say it.

He nodded, his eyes stinging. "I know. Atsuko told me. Sakura told me. I was just too stupid to listen."

She gave a raspy chuckle, squeezing his fingers. "Runs... in... family."

A tear fell into his mask, but he chuckled with her as he wiped his eyes. There were a thousand things he'd wanted to ask her, to tell her, but in that moment none of them seemed to matter.

With her free hand she reached onto her nightstand and took an envelope off of it. "This... is... yours."

He carefully opened it. There was a thick letter and a set of old photographs. Tears fell down again, clouding the images of Sakumo and Fumi. She was riding on his back when they were about five. They were sitting on the branch of a tree at ten. They were cuddled by a fire as teenagers.

"I... love you... Kakashi." She reached her hand up, running it over the side of his face.

Setting the papers down on the bed, he stood up and kissed her forehead. All the hatred he'd carried for years fell to the floor. The hurt was still there, but it wasn't raw and festering anymore. "I love you too, Mom." Maybe it wasn't exactly true, but it made her smile and for the briefest of moments she looked like she did when he was a little boy and he'd wanted so much to run into her arms.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura had picked up supper on her way home from work, hoping to surprise Kakashi, but when she got to his house, no one was there. Unlocking the door, she let herself in. At a quarter to seven, she realized that he probably wasn't coming home until late that night. While she knew she would have been welcomed to stay there until he got home, the prospect of having greeting him with him smelling of someone else only to be brushed aside again wasn't appealing.

She divided up their supper, packaging his neatly and leaving it in the fridge with a note on the door that said, "Supper's inside. I love you."

Locking the door after herself had an air of finality to it that she hadn't expected.

The rain had stopped by then and there were plenty of people on the streets, coming home from errands after work. As she passed through them, her conscience pricked her.  _Maybe he had things to do,_  she thought timidly, but her inner voice was quick with a retort, " _Then he'd have called! But who cares! It's not like the two of you are married!"_

 _Married._ A breeze picked up, wrapping around her, cold and harsh as death itself.  _Sasuke._ She walked to the cemetery, weaving through the headstones until she got to one near the back. His. She hadn't been back since the funeral, but Sarada had been leaving him flowers. Guilt stung her heart. Sasuke had left her for long periods of time, true, but she'd never once worried that he was unfaithful. He'd perhaps not been the most traditional of husbands, but he'd been hers. And she'd not even taken the time to mourn. Even then, crouched down beside his grave, the bulk of her hurt was not for the loss of Sasuke, but for what she knew would be the eventual loss of Kakashi.

_I'm an awful person._

The ringing of her phone startled her out of her thoughts and she answered it blindly, "Director Uchiha."

"Sakura," Kakashi's voice sounded broken.

"Yes," she waited.

"I'm at my mother's house. I... I don't think I'm going to leave tonight, and I'd... we'd all like it if you could come." If she'd thought guilt coursed through her before, it was nothing compared to what flooded her with those words. She'd written his behavior off as philandering without bothering to think that maybe his front was just that.

"Of course," she said. "I'll be right there."

Hanging up the phone, she reached out a hand, running it over the engraving of Sasuke's name, his clan crest. "I'm sorry. I'm a horrible wife," she whispered. "But I love him. Do you understand?"

As she stood up a flock of blackbirds took flight at the far end of the cemetery, soaring over her head with their calls to one another. Maybe that was a yes. Maybe that was a no. Sasuke was hard to read that way.


	24. Chapter 24

Sakura had seen a lot of families waiting out death in the hospital, she'd occasionally seen small families gathered around their loved one's bed in their homes, but being in Fumi's home, crowded with the Inuzuka clan was... Different. Hospitals would have been horrified by the collection of large ninkens laying about near their masters. They would have shushed the children that ran around downstairs, not fully aware of the gravity of what was happening.

Upstairs, she stood behind Kakashi, her arms wrapped around his shoulders. The twins and their children were all back in Fumi's room. Fumi was sleeping, one hand holding Kakashi's, the other Asahi's. "My... boys," she'd said just before she'd fallen asleep.

Kakashi had offered the spot to Atsuko, but she'd waved him off with a warm smile. "I've had her all these years," she said softly as she'd squeezed his shoulder. "I only wish you'd both have had more time."

Fumi's letter lay on the bed. Sakura's eyes roved over the confessions on the front page. Regret and love, anguish and hope all captured in ink. "I worry that you think I was ashamed of you. I wasn't. I never was. You were hidden because I was a coward, I pray that you won't hide from the world anymore." Over and over she apologized and explained; her words interwoven with a set of tragic love stories that spanned decades.

It made sense to Sakura, then, the reason the twins took her confession so very well. Because she'd grown to love Riichi and she'd loved the twins with every fiber of her being, but she'd never stopped loving the family she'd abandoned in hopes of keeping her first born safe from her father.

"He was a tyrant," Atsuko told Sakura when they'd gone to the kitchen to get tea for the family waiting in the room upstairs. "I was always afraid of my grandfather. He was quicker to backhand you than to smile at you. I could see why mama wanted to escape that any way she could, and why she would have been afraid to submit Kakashi to his wrath, especially as the rest of the Hatake clan had died."

Sakura had run into Kiba in the living room, Tamaki sitting beside him. "Hey," he gestured Sakura over as Atsuko continued up the stairs with her tea tray. "Is it true?"

"What's that?" She had a fair guess, but she wanted to hear it from him before she confirmed anything.

"That Kakashi's Aunt Fumi's kid."

"Yeah," Sakura said, not feeling there was any good in lying.

He gave a long breath, shaking his head. "That's wild. Man, she's the sweetest person ever." He leaned in towards Sakura and whispered, "Always kind of off, though, you know, but in an endearing sort of way. I remember once when me and Hana were kids, Hana'd roped me into making these stupid flower crowns at a family feast. Anyway, I give it to Aunt Fumi and she burst out crying, hugging me, but then she starts laughing and apologizing. She was like that. Even when her own kids were grown, she'd always have stuff for us to do here. Always had cookies and treats. Loved kids. Can't imagine her not letting Kakashi know 'til now."

"We all do things we regret," Sakura said patting Kiba on the shoulder before she raised the tray she was carrying slightly. "I need to go bring these up."

OoO*OoO*OoO

She died just before the dawn broke. Atsuko was the one to open the window. Kakashi held the envelope she'd given him in one hand, and Sakura's hand in the other. It felt like those were the only things tethering him. They left the room only for an hour to let Atsuko, the undertaker, and the priestesses to clean and dress her body. When they went back inside she was in a purple kimono, flowers all around the board that was now laying between her and the bed. The blood had been washed away from her lips and she looked pale and fragile as one of those blossoms.

The wake started immediately. The clan trickled into the room in groups of two or three at a time, greeting all the children and grandchildren with condolences. Kakashi felt like an outsider who'd invaded something deeply personal, but every time he tried to leave, someone else would gather him up in a hug or a handshake that kept him in that room.

When the last of them had come through a group of pallbearers came to carry her to the cemetery. He followed behind them, Sakura's warm grip on his hand. He was glad that when he'd called Raido the night before and given a brief explanation, the man had given him the rest of the week off. He felt like he could sleep for a week. It felt like it would take that long to push this deep down inside him.

He hadn't expected the absence of hatred to be so raw, but it was as if forgiving her had ripped a fresh scab off a festering wound. He didn't hate her any more, but he didn't love her either. He pitied her a bit, but not enough to completely excuse the choices she'd made. The fact that they'd only made peace hours before she was gone ground his spirit.

But his face was stoic and unreadable behind the mask. Decades of heartbreak had trained him well.

The thing that threatened to undo him was the feel of Sakura's hand in his, her other hand gently squeezing his forearm as they walked. In no other tragedy of his life had there ever been another person there to console him. Not that way. He was afraid of what would happen if he leaned into that comfort she offered. It would be his undoing.

As the incense wrapped around them on the breeze his mind went over the aspects of the cases he was working on. His eyes looked through the people gathered around, not seeing them or his mother who lay beside the grave she was about to be lowered into. He didn't hear the words the priestess was saying about how her body would be entombed in earth, not metal or wood, because she belonged to the earth.

When the funeral was over, he walked away wordlessly. They'd walked several blocks before he slowed and then stopped, squeezing Sakura's fingers. "I... I would really prefer to be alone today, if you don't mind."

A small, understanding smile graced the corners of her lips. "Call me if you need anything."

He nodded and turned from her, walking towards his house without looking back, his hands shoved deep in his pockets.

It made no sense to him, but he couldn't bear her sweetness then. He couldn't take the sympathy in her eyes when she looked at him. As he walked into the empty, tomb-like house, he pulled down a bottle of whiskey and sat at the table, not even bothering with a glass. Fifty-one years he'd gone without his mother and rarely had it hurt as much as it did after that half day of having her claim that he was hers. It was fleeting, like having a dragonfly lit on his fingertip, and then it was gone.

OoO*OoO*OoO

As the sun set, the bottle was empty and his thoughts were quieter. The loneliness of the house was crushing, though. He fumbled with his phone. He could call Sakura, but that would only bring up the hurt again. He could call Anko, but she'd talk him out of it. His finger scrolled through the names until he got to the one he knew would both be willing and quiet.

"Sachiko?"

"Hey, babe," the medic said, her deep voice all business. "Lonesome?"

"Can you be here in an hour?"

"Let me wrap things up here. Want me to go through the back door?"

"Yes."

He started on the bottle of rum. Sakura's face drifted into his mind. He could feel the ghost of the gently pressure of his fingers between hers.  _Are you really going to fuckin' throw that away just to not feel anything for a few damned hours?_ a voice growled in the back of his mind. He took another deep swig. Sachiko wouldn't tell anyone. Sakura would be none the wiser.

_But you would know, you worthless fucking bastard._

He was still going back and forth with himself when the back door opened. Sachiko walked like a lioness, her blonde hair bouncing with each step. "I missed you," she whispered as she leaned down and kissed his lips through the mask. His mind began to cloud over as his hand slid up her leg, under her skirt. She wasn't wearing panties and she was dripping wet.

Standing, it felt like the room spun and it took a moment for him to regain his bearings. "Don't talk," he said as he pressed a finger against her lips.

She rolled her eyes, but her hands went to his cock, rubbing it through his pants.  _You're making the biggest mistake of your life!_  He pushed the voice back as he rubbed against her clit.

_Sakura's going to **hate**  you, you miserable fuck!_

His hand halted and he took a step back.

"What the hell?" she asked, but he wasn't really paying attention to her. He was thinking of the day he'd asked Sarada if he could marry her mother. He'd said he'd wanted to do things right.  _Do things right._  How often in his life he hadn't. "I can't do this, I'm sorry," he said.

Sachiko gave a choking laugh. "Are you fucking kidding me?!" she asked. "You don't call me for months, then expect me to drop everything and come over, then you just back out! What the hell is wrong with you!?"

He glared at her, but said nothing.

"You know what? Don't call again. K? I'm done."

"Sachiko," he called after her and to his surprise she halted, although she didn't turn towards him. "I really am sorry."

Her shoulders sagged a little and she glanced back with a sad smile. "I know you are. Look, I'd be an idiot not to have noticed you and Director Uchiha. Whatever's going on between the two of you, fix it. You know I'm not going to say anything about this, but don't call me again. Ever. Deal?"

He nodded and she walked out the back door, quickly disappearing into the shadows leaving him alone with the silence of the house and the bottle of rum.


	25. Chapter 25

The next day dawned cold and cloudless. Sakura left the house earlier than she would have because she wanted to check on Kakashi before she went in to work. When her knocks went unanswered she let herself in. She found him slouched over the table, sleeping with an empty bottle of whiskey and an almost empty one of rum nearby. They'd both been full the last time she'd seen them.

He was snoring which, all things considered, was good. At least he hadn't died of alcohol poisoning. Hanging her jacket on the back of one of the chairs, gently pulled his chair out a bit and hoisted him up. His head lolled to the side. "It's a good thing you're so light," she ground out as she carried him to the bedroom.

Dropping him as carefully as she could on the bed, she stood next to him with a sigh. That was when she noticed it, the red smudge of lipstick on his mask that had been pulled down under his chin.  _You're being paranoid,_ she reminded herself,  _we've already been down this road, remember? It could be from any one of the people at the funeral._  She drew a deep breath, pushing her doubts back in her mind.

She felt slightly guilty as she grabbed her jacket and walked out the house, locking it behind her. He was going to have a killer hangover and she  _could_ have taken some of the alcohol out of his bloodstream. But removing toxins from the blood was more painful than any hangover and, in general, not a standard course of action unless someone was in danger of alcohol poisoning. He was close, but she knew him well enough to know he wouldn't finish the rum when he got up. He wasn't stupid.

Getting to the hospital with a half hour to spare, she stopped in the cafeteria to pick up breakfast. She was on her way out when Shizune walked in, her eyes growing wide for a second when she spotted Sakura. "I need to talk to you," Shizune said in hushed tones as she sided up beside her. Pulling Sakura into an empty hallway, she whispered, "You know Sachiko from the emergency department of the main hospital?"

Sakura knew  _of_  her. The woman was about ten years Sakura's senior and a capable medic. "What about her?"

Shizune hesitated for a moment as if she weren't sure how to frame what she was about to say, but a sharp look from Sakura brought it out. "Look, we were finishing up a shift together yesterday afternoon and she gets a call. I noticed KH on the screen. She told them she would wrap things up and be right over there. She's got a... bit of a reputation and something about it didn't sit well with me, so I followed her."

There was no need for Sakura to hear where exactly Shizune's impromptu meeting had brought her. She already knew.

"I'm sorry, Sakura," Shizune said, putting her hand on her friend's. "I really thought you two had something special, which is why it bothered me."

"No," Sakura pushed the pain back, masking it with a smile, "I really appreciate that you told me, but honestly we're not  _that_  serious, so let's just keep this between us."

"Sure thing."

OoO*OoO*OoO

She got everything of critical importance wrapped up that morning, rescheduling the couple of non-urgent afternoon appointments she had for later that week. Kakashi woke to extreme pain, his hands and legs bound to the bedposts as Sakura drew the alcohol from his bloodstream. "Quit!" he managed to choke out.

"I want you sober for what I'm about to say," she said, her voice all business as she floated the orb of water and alcohol out of his chest, dropping it into a waiting bowl at his bedside. "Sachiko? Seriously. Did you think I wouldn't find out?!"

For a moment it looked like he was about to vomit, but he drew a deep breath. "I-I'm sorry. I didn't sleep with her. I swear."

Sakura gave a cold laugh. "Well, thank the gods for small favors!" she spat. Looking away, she fought to keep her composure. She wanted to break every bone in his body, but a professional side of her knew there were explanations for this, and so that's the part she leaned on. When she turned back to him, it wasn't the girl he'd trained or the friend he'd had for years or the lover he'd known in the last few months who spoke. "It makes perfect sense. Excessive psychological trauma in your childhood compounded with insecurities over the strained relationship with your mother is a recipe for these kinds of coping mechanisms. You use sex and alcohol to deaden your senses. It wouldn't have done any good to fuck me. You think you actually care about me." She scoffed. "Which is funny, because you're  _actually_  incapable of caring for anyone but yourself. Classic fearful-avoidant attachment disorder."

With each word, his gaze got colder. She knew he hated it when she did that. But behind the cold stare there was a hint of despair told her he might actually be feeling an ounce of remorse. Or maybe she was just imagining it.

"Look, I understand your mother's death was a serious blow and you need to cope however works best for you. I get that. But this," she gestured between the two of them, "has to stop. I'm still your friend. That's it. You can go back to whatever cycle of women works best for you, but I  _will not_  spend my nights wondering who exactly it is you're fucking."

There was a long pause, and she turned to go. "Don't tell Sarada why, please," his voice so low it was barely audible.

His words hit her heart. At least he worried about someone. "I won't," she said as she walked out the room leaving him tied. He could get himself out a simple binding easily enough, but he didn't go after her.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi sat in the bed, shedding the last of bindings, the silence of the house strangling him. She was gone. He gasped, but it was like there was no oxygen. His head spun and he struggled out of the sheets, stumbling for the bathroom. He drew deep lungfuls of air, but it felt like he was smothering. Falling to his knees in front of the toilet, he wretched, his body trembling.

 _It's just a panic attack, you pathetic fuck,_ the sinister voice inside his head reminded him with complete calm.

But it didn't feel like "just" an anything. It felt like he was going to die. Which, he thought, would probably be a good thing. He'd thrown away everything he'd ever wanted, and for what? Nothing.

_She's gone._

_She's not coming back._

_I'm alone. I'm going to die alone._

_And I deserved it._

He drug himself up, trying to force his breathing to go back to normal as his vision swam. Hot tears pooled and he didn't even fight them as he made his way to the bed, collapsing onto it again.  _"You think you actually care about me. Which is funny, because you're actually incapable of caring for anyone but yourself."_  He didn't think it was true, but what did he know. Maybe he'd only thought he loved her.

Digging the box out of his pocket, his trembling fingers ran over the minuscule blossoms.  _"I'd be a good husband."_  That's what he'd told her while he lay in a drunken stupor on the remnants of a battlefield, trying to convince her that he loved her. Good husband. That was a joke. Sitting up, he threw the box against the far wall of the room, watching it break and scatter over the floor. The ring, though, lay there glinting in a sunbeam, completely unblemished.

Getting out of bed he plucked the ring off the wood floor, holding it in his palm. There was an unspoken prayer that like that ring Sakura would emerge from his stupidity unharmed. He tucked it back into his pocket promising himself that when he left the house, he'd go get a chain to put it on. He'd wear it around his neck as a reminder of what he'd lost and why.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura stared at the bed. Their bed. She couldn't bring herself to sleep on the sofa one more night. Going to their weapons box, she carefully removed his hitai-tie, the one he'd worn as a child. Sasuke had told her that as a teenager, he'd carry it with him as a talisman of sorts, but he could never bring himself to wear it again. Taking it with her, she lay down in the bed. A talisman.

She pulled one of the pillows near her, cradling it, her other hand holding the hitai-tie tightly. "I'm so sorry," she whispered as the tears took her. The last time he'd been home, she remembered waking to see him staring at her as if she were the most beautiful thing in the world. Those moments were rare, but they were genuine. Sasuke was not one to waste words. If he bothered to say something, he meant it. If he bothered to show someone affection or attention it was because they were precious to him.

And she'd sullied his memory throwing herself after a man she'd been stupid enough to think was anything like him. The Copy Nin. She scoffed as she bit her lip.  _I was so stupid._  Bringing the hitai-tie up to her lips she kissed it. "I'm sorry," she whispered again as if he could hear her.

In the morning, she would take a shower and fix herself up. She would walk out into the sunlight with her head held high. She was an Uchiha, after all. That demanded that one carry themselves with a certain amount of dignity.  _This will be the last night I cry for Kakashi Hatake,_ she promised herself.


	26. Chapter 26

"What do you mean you broke up with him!?" Sarada's voice almost echoed off the walls of her mother's kitchen.

"Exactly what I said," Sakura said with a forced smile she scooped a helping of chow mein onto her daughter's plate.

"When?!"

"About two weeks ago."

"But why!?"

Sakura gave her daughter a flat look. "That's between the two of us; it has nothing to do with you. But if you're worried, we're still friends."

"Friends? Mom, he loves you so much."

"I'm sorry you're taking this so hard, but honestly we're two  _very_  different people and we just realized we weren't compatible."

"Not compatible?" Sarada choked. "I've never met two more compatible people in my entire life!"

With a sigh, Sakura handed her daughter the plate. "Pass me a spring roll, please."

"Don't you love him?"

"I care deeply about him, but you're old enough to understand that sometimes just loving someone isn't enough to make things work."

"You could try."

"Some things  _can't_   _be_  fixed, Sarada. I know you wanted us all to be one happy family, but honestly Kakashi and I are better letting things go back to the way before we started this crazy experiment. But enough about me, what have you been up to."

For the rest of the evening, whenever Sarada tried to direct the conversation back to her mother's failed relationship, Sakura evaded.  _If I'd been this stubborn, Boruto and I would have never gotten back together,_  she thought with a fond smile as she thought of her occasionally knuckleheaded boyfriend. She left the house not long after supper was over, shoving her hands into her coat pockets as she walked. She'd taken Kakashi's advice, and had given herself a few months to sort out her feelings. Her temper cooled, and she'd seen that Boruto corrected his ways. She'd been only too happy to work through things with him.

OoO*OoO*OoO

When Kakashi opened the door, Sarada's jaw hung slack. She'd never seen him without his mask on, but there he was, standing on the doorstep, the only thing gracing his cheeks was about a day's worth of silver stubble. "Yo," he said with a forced smile. He had dimples. Who would have guessed?

"You... wha... it's gone?" She gestured around her own mouth, dumbfounded.

"Yeah," he said, opening the door a bit wider. "Come in."

She drew a deep breath, pushing her shock back as she focused on the task at hand. "Mom told me about the breakup," she said, "and I know you don't really like ice cream as much as I do, so." She pulled a bottle of whiskey and two glasses out her bag.

He gave a single chuckle as he shook his head. "That's sweet, but I quit."

Now she knew she had entered an alternate reality. Even when she'd been a little girl, she'd realized that hard missions meant the possibility that Kakashi would wind up on their doorstep, stumbling drunk. He wasn't like some men, though, who got violent and loud. If anything, it turned him sweeter. Whenever he showed up that way, he'd have some kind of present for her. A stuffed animal. A doll. A necklace when she was a little older.

_"That's so when your mama gets tired of letting me crash here, you'll still open the door," he'd stage whispered to her one night as he ruffled her hair with and eye-crinkling grin, only to turn to Sakura a moment later and present her with a set of earrings._

_"This isn't a hotel," Sakura had said, trying and failing to sound stern._

_"I know. Hotels serve breakfast." He chuckled. "Here, I cook breakfast." He'd winked at Sarada before he fell onto the sofa with a sigh._

"I'm sorry," Sarada said as she put the things back in the bag.

"Nothing to be sorry about," he said, "you didn't know. Want some tea?"

"That'd be nice," she said, watching as he put the kettle on.

"How's your mom?"

"She's sad, but not letting it show. You know how she gets."

He nodded, his lips a thin line. "I'm sorry I screwed things up so badly."

"What happened? Mom wouldn't give me a straight answer."

He pulled down the jar of tea and the mugs before he answered. "I've got issues that she shouldn't have to deal with, and she got smart to that."

"But you love her."

"Loving someone means wanting the best for them. I'm not the best your mom could do by a long shot."

Sarada's shoulders fell, her eyes stinging a bit.

When he came back with the steaming cups of tea, he gave her an understanding smile. "Come over here." He wrapped his arms around her, resting his head on top of hers. "This doesn't change anything. You understand. You can still come talk to me whenever you need. You're still..." His voice trailed away.

"Your little girl," Sarada offered, the words breaking her heart.

"Yeah." She heard felt the sharp, ragged intake of air that told her he was trying to keep from crying. A moment later, though, he let her go, chuckling, a forced smile back in place. "So how's your team doing? I hear my nephew's on it."

Sarada laughed, forcing herself not to dwell on either of their heartaches. "I've heard that as well. He's just over the moon that he's related to the Rokudaime, the famous Copy Nin. I swear, I hadn't seen him that excited for anything before."

"He's a sweet kid," Kakashi said.

OoO*OoO*OoO

When she left, Kakashi waited in the foyer for a few minutes before he gathered his cloak and slid on his shoes. Sarada's visit had made him a little late, but just the little bit of normalcy he'd gotten from talking to her was worth it. Sleet was beginning to fall as he made his way towards the hospital. He went the long way, down streets he was almost certain Sakura would avoid.

_Last week he'd run into her on the front steps. Both of them had halted when their eyes met. Sakura was the first one to smile. It was tense and would have been completely without warmth if he didn't know exactly how much it had cost her. He returned it. It would have been easier to be stabbed. "How've you been?" she asked as she walked up to him._

_"Good," he lied smoothly. "You?"_

_"Good," she said with a smile that was a bit more natural. "Well, have a nice evening." He was fairly sure she thought she knew why he was going to the hospital._

_"You too."_

_And then she was gone, her scent fading behind her. He'd inhaled deeply, his fingers going up to the ring he'd tucked in his shirt._

Today he made it into the hospital without running into her, making his way up an empty stairwell to the forth floor. The door was already closed. A clock on the wall told him he was already fifteen minutes late. By his typical standards, that was pretty good. "Ah, good, Kakashi!" Dr. Saito said with a warm smile as she gestured to an empty seat next to Tenzo, who looked shocked to see Kakashi sans mask, but said nothing.

When Tenzo had suggested the group months before, Kakashi had laughed it off. He didn't do feelings. He sure as hell didn't want to sit around with a bunch of other ninja and cry over things that were better buried down deep where they belonged. Losing Sakura, though, had shaken up his priorities.

_This was only his second week, but he was still surprised to see as many people as there were. None was more shocking, though, than Ibiki Morino, whose hulking form looked strange sitting in a folding chair. Konoha's chief interrogator/torturer seemed, at least to Kakashi, to be wholly out of place in a group designed to help combat nin deal with civilian life. When they had a break halfway through, though, Ibiki had come up to him. "Good to see you here, Hataki."_

_"You too," Kakashi said, hiding his confusion._

_It was during the last part of that session that Kakashi learned that Ibiki had recently become a father to a little girl. There seemed to be a lot of that in the group, men and women, especially from his generation, who were finding themselves in domestic situations where their skill sets and habits were not only not necessary, but often detrimental._

"So Kakashi, why don't you go next? Tell us about your week," Dr. Saito said.

"Well," he shifted in the chair, his hand scrubbing his beard, wishing for the comfort of being hidden. "My... my ex-girlfriend's daughter came to see me today. That's why I'm late." He was surprised there weren't any snickers. He was always late. "She just found out about the break-up. Brought me a bottle of whiskey." He chuckled as he looked down at the carpet in the center of the circle. "You could read the shock in her eyes when I told her no, because that's how I've always coped. It just showed me what a piss poor example I've been all her life."

"So you helped raise her?"

He nodded, several of the people he knew better silently agreeing with him. "Her mom and I were just friends until her husband died, then things just sort of spiraled out control."

"So what made you decide to leave the mask at home?"

He ran his tongue behind the back of his teeth, resisting the urge to bite his lip.  _To honor my mother's last wishes? Too many questions. To show Sakura I'm capable of changing? Too revealing._ "I'm not active duty any more," he said with a shrug.

She thanked him for sharing and moved on to someone else. Kakashi half listened as his mind wandered over the real reason he'd decided to lay aside his mask. Maybe it was just because if he were starting over, he just as soon do it completely. He got to work on time every morning. In the afternoons, rather than lazing about reading, he worked out. The only four women's numbers he still had in his phone were Sakura, Sarada, Anko (because she at least tried to understand his midlife crisis, as she put it), and Atsuko (who had made it a point to invite him to supper every few days).

He would be lying, though, if he didn't admit Sakura played a large part in that decision.

Unfortunately, the truth was, even if Sakura realized he was trying to change, he doubted those changes would change anything between them. He'd betrayed the one ground rule she'd set for them. A small, unselfish part of him hoped that she'd move on and find someone who could love her the way she should be loved. The rest of him just wanted to be able to make it through the winter without killing himself.


	27. Chapter 27

Spring came to Konoha with a string of pristine days. All around the hospital trees and gardens were blossoming and coming back to life. It had been a long, cold winter.

Sakura sat on the terrace of the hospital with Chie, who was writing an essay for the upcoming adoption fair. "Why don't you want to go?" Sakura asked, tilting her head slightly to better meet Chie's eyes.

"They won't like me," Chie said with only a glance towards Sakura.

"Honey, you can't know that. There will be several families there."

"No one wants me in their family," she said, her eyes now focused fully on the meticulous movements of her pencil. Her speech was like those strokes of the pencil, almost painfully slow and intentional. Each word was something earned, both by her and by her listener. Sakura couldn't help but think that someone out there must be able to see that.

"That's not true," Sakura said patiently. "We just haven't found the  _right_  family yet."

Chie said nothing as she laid the pencil down and held the paper up for Sakura to read it. The girl had proven to be exceptionally bright. She'd gone from only a rudimentary vocabulary to being able to read and write in less than a year. The paper read, "In the future, I will go to the Academy and study hard. I will be a medic like Dr. Sakura. I will learn to heal people who can't heal themselves. I will grow strong enough to protect people like her husband did for me. I sleep in a bed now, and know how to fold my clothes. I don't scream at people or hit them. The only thing I want in a family is for them to love me all the time."

"I shouldn't have added the last part," Chie muttered.

"I think that's a very important thing to look for in a family," Sakura said with a smile. "And it's not too much to ask."

Chie pursed her lips, obviously not believing Sakura, but she nodded.

"I tell you what, after we meet with the families, how about I take you to Firefly Festival? It would be fun." The village had been setting up the last few days in a nearby meadow and Sakura had taken Chie by to see what they were doing. The girl was intrigued by all the paper lanterns and decorations going up.

Chie nodded with a faint smile.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura was grateful she'd thought to offer a trip to the festival, because the adoption fair did not go at all how she'd hoped it would. Of course, she knew that the younger children would have an easier time finding homes, but it had broken her heart to see Chie sitting alone at a table, her eyes downcast as potential parents gravitated towards the outgoing youngsters. "Hi there," Sakura said as she slid into the chair opposite her.

"Hi." Chie's eyes didn't look up. Her nostrils flared as her jaw tightened, then she swallowed hard.

"I got you something," Sakura said. "Why don't we sneak away for a few minutes?"

Taking the little girl's hand in hers, she led her to her office and took the gift box off her desk. "Here."

Chie's eyes went wide as she looked at the floral wrapping paper and iridescent ribbon. "It's... beautiful," she said reverently.

Sakura had half expected that. Chie had no idea what a present was. "Your gift is inside there. You have to open it."

"Open it?" Chie sounded horrified.

"Here, we can do it carefully and you can save the paper and ribbon if you'd like," Sakura offered, gently taking the package away and turning it over. Her fingers carefully undid the tape. "See. Sometimes you have to take things apart to get to the good part."

When they lifted the lid off the box, Chie gasped. Her fingers ran over the embroidered flowers on the silk fabric of the purple kimono. Tears welled in her eyes as her trembling hands lifted the dress out of the box. "This is... for me?"

"Yes," Sakura said with a smile. "Why don't you go put it on? You can wear it to the festival after we leave here."

To Sakura's surprise, Chie threw her arms around Sakura's neck. "Thank you," she said, warm tears spilling onto Sakura's shirt. "It's beautiful."

"Go try it on," Sakura said, gesturing towards the bathroom. "I'll help you tie the obi when you get out."

They girl almost skipped towards the bathroom, only to come out a few minutes later, swirling around in the kimono Sakura had picked up from a dress shop two days before. While grown ups generally just wore their normal clothes, little girls always dressed up for the Firefly Festival. Sakura considered Chie dressing up as important to her feeling like she was part of the village.

"You're absolutely beautiful," Sakura said, gesturing with the obi for Chie to come closer. She couldn't help thinking back of when Sarada was a girl and she'd done this same thing. The prodding little thought came back into her head. She had an empty bedroom since Sarada had moved out. Chie needed a family and Sakura was fond of the little girl. But she also wasn't sure that she felt up to the task of being a single parent again.

Not that she'd really been a single parent the first time.

"There," Sakura said, patting the bow with a satisfied smile. "Now, let's go back and talk to some people."

"Do I have to?" Sorrow replaced the joy in her eyes and voice.

Sakura bit back a sigh. "Not if you don't want to."

She couldn't bear the idea of the girl growing up in a group home, but even she had to admit that if she didn't find a family in the next month or so, that's where she was headed. It had been a task to extend her stay in the hospital as long as she had. Neither place was well suited for a delicate child like Chie.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi had gone back and forth over going to the festival. Genma was the who finally convinced him with a healthy dose of guilt that now that he'd quit going to The Broken Cup and retired, he never saw his friends anymore. So he found himself sitting with Genma, Anko, Raido and his wife, Ibiki and his girlfriend at a booth watching the dancers on the stage and drinking tea. Tenzo had been there, but had abandoned him to talk with a civilian woman, who made Tenzo blush with something she said.

Was it possible to feel like a ninth wheel? Kakashi decided it was.

He was debating going home when he spotted her across the festival ground. Her pink hair was put up in a bun, a teal kanzashi pinned in it that matched her teal kimono and her eyes. Beside her, he recognized Chie in a purple kimono, her short brown hair pulled up in a ponytail with flowers tucked into it. Sakura bent down to show Chie a mask on display at one of the booths, and when she rose, their eyes locked.

There was that smile. The one that tore at his heart. The one he'd been missing for three months while he avoided her. Now it felt like there was a gulf between them. Like she was the mainland and he was drowning. Everything in him wanted to go to her. To brush that stray hair back behind her ear. To feel her delicate fingers intertwined with his.

But then Chie pulled her hand and she gave a little, apologetic wave, disappearing into the crowd.

His hand went up to his chest, feeling the ring under the fabric of his shirt.  _You brought this on yourself. Never forget that._

Genma leaned against his shoulder. "Ya oughta go talk to her," he whispered around the senbon.

"No," Kakashi said softly. "She's better off without me."

He stayed because now and then he'd catch a glimpse of her. When all the lanterns were extinguished he spotted her again, this time standing alone beneath a willow tree.  _Go_   _to_   _her_ , a small voice whispered in his ear. He fought against it. He'd meant what he said to Genma. She deserved better.

But then she turned to him, her teal eyes locking on his darker ones and there was that smile again. She beckoned him over and he was just as lost as he'd been that first night they'd made love. That was when he fully came to realize that he'd go wherever she commanded him, do whatever she asked of him.

As he moved the draping branches aside to join her fireflies startled off the disrupted limbs, fluttering all around them. "Yo," he said.

She smiled. "Yo. I love this festival." Her fingers went up to a nearby branch, waiting as a firefly crawled onto her hand.

 _I love you._ But all he said was, "It's a beautiful night." What he meant was,  _You're beautiful._

"Chie's been having so much fun." She giggled and the sound made Kakashi's heart ache.

"Where is she?"

"With Sarada and Boruto." She lowered her hand and the firefly flew away. "I'm going to adopt her."

"That's good. She needs you."  _More than I do, but I still need you._

She laughed again, shifting her weight as her gaze lowered. "I haven't seen you in so long that I thought you'd moved away."

He shook his head. "Just busy at work."

"I like the beard."

"Thanks."

"I've missed you."

"I've missed you, too."  _You have no idea how much._ Every morning brought the same dull ache, remembering the feeling of waking up in her arms. "You should come to the Inuzuka feast next month. Atsuko said she was going to invite you."

"Are you asking me out?" It wasn't teasing, but it wasn't cold, only curious; like she'd asked about what the weather may do tomorrow.

"No."

"Will you be there?"

His breath caught.  _Will she refuse if I am?_ "Yes."

"Then I might go," she said with a shy smile, her teal eyes meeting his and holding his gaze for the first time since they'd started talking. How much restraint it took not to take the four steps that would close the gap between them. To hold her. To kiss her lips.

Fireworks went off flooding the sky with color that rained down above them, bathing them in rainbow hues. Her eyes didn't leave his though. She barely bit her bottom lip, her weight shifting as if she wanted to go to him. Everything in him willed her to do it. But her feet stayed planted. "It was nice seeing you again," she said softly, her gaze going towards the crowd. "I ought to go find the others."

She was gone, the scent of her and fireflies dancing all around him.

"I love you." His whisper was lost in the crackling explosion of another firework.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song for this chapter is When You Sleep- Mary Lambert


	28. Chapter 28

The shrill chime of his cell phone woke Kakashi early on a Sunday morning. He fumbled for the phone. "Hatake."

"Ka...Kakashi, I need you. Please." It was Anko and she was sobbing.

He sat up. Sleep abandoning him. "What happened?"

"They... brought him into the hospital. Please," her voice broke and he heard her curse under her breath. "Please, just come."

 _Genma. Fucking hell._ "I'll be right there."

He was there in seven minutes. Anko was pacing the floor of the ER's operating room waiting room, biting her crimson fingernails. The medic that was standing in the near the doorway excused himself when Kakashi walked in. As soon as Anko saw him, she stopped, her face contorting in a failed attempt to keep from crying. She mouthed something wordlessly moments before his arms wrapped around her.

"Shhh." He rubbed her back. He wanted to tell her he'd pull through it, but they both would have known that could be a lie. And they didn't lie to each other. Was it Sakura back there trying to piece him back together? He hoped so. It would be Genma's best chance of surviving.

Anko pulled away, wiping the tears from her face, cursing at her smeared mascara. "They say he got caught up in an explosion. Burned over 90% of his body. They don't know if they'll be able to salvage his leg." Two more tears rolled down her cheeks, and she grimaced, wiping them away angrily. "That stupid, fucking, proud bastard!"

They spent the next six hours in that room. Kakashi listening to Anko rant. They exchanged stories like they were at his wake and then chastised each other for it. She cried a lot and cursed a lot. She admitted what Sakura had told Kakashi all those months ago. The only man she'd ever loved was Genma Shiranui.

"You know how I met him?" she asked as she sat across the tiny room from Kakashi.

"No."

"I stole his wallet." She laughed. "He caught me too. I sucked as a pickpocket. Know what he did?"

He shook his head.

"Took me out for supper. He was nine and I was six."

They both chuckled.

"He was too cool. I couldn't rattle him, no matter what I did. Damn it! What the fuck am I going to do if he dies?!" She cradled her head in her hands, biting off a scream.

The door opened and both stood quickly. It was Sakura who walked in. She seemed on the verge of collapsing. But she smiled. "He's going to make it."

Anko's knees crumbled under her as she drew deep lungfuls of air. "Thank you," she whispered. "Thank you. Thank you." Fresh tears poured down her face as she looked up at Sakura. "Can I see him?"

"He's in recovery and he probably won't wake for several days," Sakura said, "but you can sit with him if you'd like." Walking over to Anko, she crouched down and put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm going to warn you. His face is very badly burned."

"He's alive. The rest doesn't matter."

Sakura stood again, offering her hand to Anko, who took it and rose. "Come on, I'll bring you to him." She glanced at Kakashi on her way out, and he knew to stay.

She returned ten minutes later and leaned her back against the wall, her head dropping onto her chest with a sigh. "Thanks for being here for her," she said.

Of all the things he'd expected her to say, that was not it.

"She was beside herself. We were worried we'd have to sedate her."

"Is it as bad as she said?"

"Worse. We'll be lucky if he'll be able to see with both eyes. The left side of his body took the brunt of the damage. That leg is gone. Three fingers on the left hand as well. He'll probably wind up in here for the better part of a year."

"But he'll live?"

She nodded. "If he's got the will to when he wakes." Her gaze was on the beige floor tiles.

He couldn't imagine wanting to live that way. Maybe blind. Crippled. Deformed.

"Do you think she'll stay with him?" Sakura's voice was small. Fearful.

"Yeah." After hearing her talk about him, he was sure of that. Whose idea had it been that they took other lovers? He had no idea. Maybe it was both of theirs. He hoped it had been hers. That Genma had wanted her to himself. Because he was certain after this she would be devoted to him. She'd almost lost him. That changes people, makes them see the naked truth.

Sakura yawned. "I'm sorry," she muttered. "I've got to go get some sleep."

"Are you going home?"

"No, I'm staying here in case there are any changes. I'm going to the doctors' dorms."

"Can I walk you there?"

She hesitated for a moment, but she nodded. Maybe she was too tired to argue.

"How's Chie?" Kakashi asked as they walked.

"Good," she said with a faint smile. "She's coming to stay with me this weekend to try it out."

"She'll be lucky to have you as a mom," he said softly.

"I don't know about all that," Sakura gave a single, half-hearted chuckle. "Sarada can tell stories about days being the only one at home because I was working. Or times like last night where I have to leave with just a quick note. I wonder if I'm even doing right by her."

"You did a great job with Sarada. You'll do a great job with Chie."

Her hand reached out for his. Her skin was electric against his callouses. It was the first time she'd touched him in four months. She squeezed his fingers, leaning her head against his arm for the briefest moment. It took all his strength not to reach for her again as her fingers released his, her hand falling back to her side. "Thanks. This is me," she said pointing to a pale green door.

"Thank you, for saving him."

She unlocked the door. "It's my job, but you're welcome. I'll see you around."

"Sweet dreams."

OoO*OoO*OoO

She should have showered, but she was afraid she'd collapse. Kicking off her shoes she walked blindly to the bed and fell into it. He'd survived, she reminded herself as her eyes began to water. He'd survived. That was all she could say. She hadn't been able to save his leg. She wasn't entirely sure she'd saved his eyes. Her mind went back to the memories she had of him. He was cocky. Handsome and he knew it. Skilled and he knew it. He was proud. Too proud to retire when he should have. Too proud to beg Anko for what he wanted.

He would kill himself.

She was sure of it, and it made all her efforts that night and morning seem so futile. She cried herself to sleep, her dreams full of blood and the smell of charred flesh.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Three days later, she was in her office when there was a knock on the door. "Come in," she called as she closed the file she'd been reading.

Kakashi walked in. His gaze briefly went to the sofa where they'd eaten so many Sunday breakfasts. God, she missed that. "He's awake," he said. "He asked to see you."

She nodded. "How is he taking it?"

"Better than I expected."

"That may be the medicine." It would be better to brace him for the worst than to prop up hopes.

"He's cracking jokes."

 _That may be the medicine,_ she thought to herself, but didn't bother repeating it as she stood. Time had shown promise that he'd be able to see fine. Sakura wasn't sure if that was a blessing or a curse. His hair was mostly gone. His left year was gone; the right one mainly gone. His face was a twisted mess of flesh that would take months to remodel into something resembling the man he'd been.

"Hey, Doc," he said as she walked in. His voice was weak, but still had that cocky drawl. "Where the fuck is my senbon?"

She forced a smile. "Probably in one of the rogues you killed before they detonated the device."

He chuckled. "Yeah, I told them they oughtta see the other guys, but they're actin' like I'm fuckin' done for."

"Well, you'll be laid up for a while. Consider it a well-earned vacation."

Scoffing he said, "This is about the crappy ass kind of vacation I'd wind up with. Anyway, I wanted to thank you. I heard you're the one that put me back together."

"I did the best I could."

"Well, not one of these bastards'll let me see my fuckin' self, but" he rubbed the stub where his leg should have been, "I know you can regrow one of these." Raising his bandaged hand that was missing fingers he added, "And these."

"That's true, but it's not always successful. It may take some time to get used to them as well."

"Can I get a mirror?"

Sakura weighed out the options. In some cases it was worse to wait. Anko and Kakashi were there to support him after all.

"I know I probably look worse than Ibiki, but dammit it's not too fuckin' much to ask to see it for myself." His voice wasn't exactly angry, just exasperated.

"Give me a minute," she said as she walked out the room. When she came back she had a large hand mirror. "Keep in mind, we can fix a lot of the damage," she said as she handed him the mirror and started to remove the bandages. The skin was blistered and angry. 

He chuckled as the last layer of bandages came off. Looking at Anko, his voice was truly bitter for the first time. "Guess you'll have a damned easy time finding men you prefer to me now."

Tears flooded Anko's eyes, but they didn't fall. She didn't say anything. Her gaze refusing to leave him.

Sakura felt like a voyeur. "Do you want us to leave?"

"Nah," he said. A twisted smile and another scoff. "You're a shrink, right? You think she's crazy enough to want to fuck this? Or is there a shred of sanity there? Huh, Anko, you depraved enough to want to fuck a monster? I make ol' Orochimaru look like a fuckin' model, now don't I, babe?"

"Genma!" Kakashi snapped at him.

"You stay the fuck out of this, Hatake! I swear to god, another word out of you and I will fuckin' hobble out of this bed and kick your ass!" His fists balled, all his muscles tense. "This is between me, Anko, and Dr.  _Uchiha_."

For a moment it looked like Kakashi was going to make a retort, but he just cursed under his breath and walked out the door.

"It's perfectly normal to be angry," Sakura said. "But Anko's been here since they brought you in here. You're not being fair to her."

"It's okay." Anko's voice was flat, her gaze still locked on Genma. "He has every right to be mad at me. It was my idea, you know. Us fucking around. I was an idiot when we were younger, and I guess old habits die hard, right?" Her gaze grew slightly colder. "But you were so fucking indifferent. You acted like it didn't matter what I did!"

"Because I love you, dammit! Why the fuck is that so hard for you to fucking understand!"

Her breath caught. "You love me?"

"For fuck's sake, why the hell do you think I've stuck around so long, woman?!"

The tears she'd been fighting against fell down Anko's cheeks as a smile dawned on her lips. "I've always loved you."

"Okay," Sakura said softly. "I'm going to go out into the hallway for a minute and give you two some time to talk." She backed out the door and turned to find Kakashi leaning against the wall. "I think they'll be fine," she whispered.

"Yeah, I figured they would," he said. "I'm just sorry I didn't see what was there before. He's right to hate me."

"He doesn't hate you, Kakashi. He's angry at everything."

Kakashi scoffed. "I was a pathetic excuse for a friend."

"From what I gather, there was a lot of blame to go around in that situation."

He pursed his lips, drawing a deep breath through his nose. For a moment it looked like he would say something, but he just nodded and stood up straight. "I'll see you around."

She watched him walk away. Sarada's words a few weeks back came to her.  _"He's been sober for months, Mom. If you don't see the changes he's making in his life, you're blind."_ She saw them, though. It wasn't just the literal mask that had come off. Ino had drug her to The Broken Cup last week, and she'd overheard a couple women complaining about the fact that he'd apparently "taken himself off the market," as they put it. He was on time for everything, Sarada told her. Icha Icha had apparently been relegated to his house.

The thing that surprised her the most, though, were the things he'd just said. "I was a pathetic excuse for a friend." She'd been honest that there was plenty of blame to go around. Him acknowledging his part in it was big. She'd seen the acceptance in his eyes when she'd said what she had. There had been a lot of wrong done on all sides, but he'd chosen to claim his own part of it.

She missed him.

Two weeks before, she'd been asked out. The man was perfectly nice. He came from a respectable family. He had a nice job and a nice smile. But she couldn't bring herself to it.

Because the truth was, her heart was already torn in two and that was enough. Half of her in love with a ghost. Half of her in love with a man she wasn't sure she knew anymore.  _Because of you,_ she reminded herself. She hoped it wasn't because of her. Not entirely. Because if it were all for her it would come unraveled.

_It's his life, though. Not yours._

She thought about the couple behind the door, who'd been in love and hurting each other over the last decades. All because they couldn't say what they wanted, what they needed. So she pushed and he dodged. He pushed and she ran. It had taken her almost losing him, him losing himself, for them to see it.

_But they're not us, and we're not them._

No, she was Sakura Uchiha, a woman about to become a mother again.

And he was Kakashi Hatake, a man whose body she remembered every inch of, but who had become someone different. Someone foreign.

She wasn't sure if she was in love with that new man.

And so she waited.


	29. Chapter 29

Atsuko and Sakura sat on a park bench watching the girls playing with each other. Her granddaughter, Tani, was a few years younger than Chie, but they loved each other. "Will you come to the feast?" Atsuko asked.

"I don't know," Sakura answered honestly.

"You did so much for mama, though, and everyone would want you there."

A single mirthless chuckle escaped Sakura's lips before she could stop it.

"He still loves you, you know." Atsuko wasn't looking at Sakura.

"Has he told you that?"

Now Atsuko turned to her, her eyes full of disbelief. "He doesn't have to. The change in him whenever anyone mentions your name is palpable."

Sakura picked at the hem of her shirt, rolling it over her fingertips. "I'm not sure I can still love him." The admission was barely a whisper.

"Give him another chance," Atsuko wasn't quite pleading, but she was toeing the line.

"I'm about to adopt that little girl." Sakura inclined her chin towards Chie. "I'm not sure it wouldn't be fair to anyone to add a strained relationship to that mix."

"You told me he helped raise Sarada."

Her mind went back to birthdays. Holidays. Pancakes and bacon in the morning. Playing board games in the living room. Him reading Sarada bedtime stories. Him stumbling in after a hard mission. Her whispering to him in the darkness of the living room after she'd put Sarada to bed. Bandaging up the wounds on his flesh and in his spirit. Him holding her when she cried because Naruto had gotten another letter from Sasuke and she hadn't. The night he told her if she hadn't been married he would have taken her and fire it had lit inside her. The first night they'd had sex. The first night they'd made love.

"That was a different person. I don't know who he is anymore."

"Then come to the feast. Get to know him again."

OoO*OoO*OoO

His breath caught when he spotted her, standing at the edge of the crowded meadow. Pink hair in a sea of brown. When her eyes met his he was the first one to smile, but she quickly returned it and it felt like he could breathe again.

"I didn't think you'd come," he said as he walked up to her.

Her gaze roamed over the crowd, refusing to meet his eyes and she gave a chuckle that had a nervous edge to it. "I wasn't sure if I would or not."

"I'm glad you decided to come." Every part of him wanted to reach out and touch her. So he held out his hand.

She chuckled again as she shook it. Her fingers were warm on his. "There are a lot of people here."

He looked out over the sea of faces spread out at picnic tables and lounging on blankets in the sunlight. "And dogs." He gave her a lopsided grin. "My ninken are around here somewhere." His gaze roamed the crowd until he found them. "I'm thinking about giving the scroll to my nephew, Haruto, Asahi's son." It made sense. He'd never have a son of his own. The scroll was Haruto's birthright and it wasn't as if he'd be using it working in an office.

"Are you sure?"

"Not yet. Where's Chie?"

"Sarada's bringing her later, she and ChoCho had her over last night. It was sweet of you to invite them."

"Has she already moved in with you?"

"Yes, the Orphan Board decided that would be best for her. The adoption will be finalized next month."

He nodded. There were so many things he wanted to say to her. That he'd be there for her. That if she needed anything... anything at all, to ask. But then he remembered Sarada showing up at his doorstep with a bottle of whiskey. He'd done a crap job of it last go round.

"Good morning!" A man's voice boomed over a loudspeaker and Kakashi and Sakura turned their attention to the stage. "Welcome to the Inuzuka Clan Spring Feast! You know what that means." Laughter scattered around the crowd. "Can I have the oldest, unmarried male of each household up here?"

A moment later Atsuko was at Kakashi's side, her hand wrapped around his wrist, pulling him towards the stage. "That's you," she said with a knowing, mischievous smile.

"What is this?" He looked over his shoulder at Sakura who shrugged with a giggle. When they got to the stage, an old woman handed him a sprig of cherry blossoms. He stood awkwardly along with men who were, for the most part, much younger than him. There were a few people, like Haruto, who were only children.

"Okay, most of you know the drill," the announcer said with a chuckle. "You've got until sundown to give that to the woman you love and get a kiss. Come on, boys, do us proud. Those Hyuga still have a couple dozen members more than we do, but I'm sure we can pull ahead by next year." There was a chorus of wolf whistles and laughter.

 _Cherry blossoms._  He glared at Atsuko, but it only made her giggle harder. She'd known this all along. He felt mildly betrayed. "You are an evil, evil little sister," he muttered to her as all the bachelors walked away from the stage.

"Hey, I've got to make up for lost time," she snickered. "Sakura's waiting for you." With a wink, she walked away, still chuckling to herself.

Every step towards her felt like a mile. She was as pink as her hair, biting the inside of her bottom lip. The idea that she would turn and walk away was almost crippling, but she stayed. "I didn't know they did that," he said, scrubbing the back of his neck when he finally got to where she was waiting.

"It's... interesting," she said.

"So, I guess these are for you." He held out the sprig of blossoms but she didn't take them and he pulled them back to himself a bit.  _That was stupid. Of course she didn't want to walk around with some token of his love. You betrayed her._ "I'm sorry."

When his gaze met hers, she smiled, reaching out and taking the blossoms. "Thank you," she said, bringing them to her nose and sniffing them. She made a beautiful picture standing there, the bough held to her face. With a faint smile, she took the two steps to close the gap between them.

He froze.

Tiptoeing up, she pressed her warm, soft lips on his cheek. He wished he could have turned slightly, met her lips with his, but that would be too much. She took a single step back, smiling up at him. "Mission successful."

 _It was all part of the game._ He returned her smile. "Thanks. Come on, let's go find a spot before the girls get here. Would you prefer a blanket or a table?"

"It wouldn't be a picnic without a blanket," Sakura said with a smile.

"Come on, Atsuko has enough extra ones to open a hotel." He offered her his arm and they made their way through the crowd. "How's Genma?"

"You ought to come check on him yourself," she said, a challenge gleaming in her eyes.

He nodded. He knew that. If for no other reason than to apologize, he needed to go back. He owed Genma at least that much. In the last week he'd thought a lot about what he'd heard that Sunday morning. He remembered the first time Anko had seduced him on that rooftop. In his mind they would have kept it undercover. That would have been bad enough. But the next time they were all together, she'd snaked her arms around Kakashi's shoulders, dropping an easy kiss on his cheek. "Hey there, Hatake," she'd purred. "Thanks for the other day." Genma had been sitting across the table from him and had merely raised an eyebrow.

In the last week, he'd thought about what he'd have done if the tables had been reversed. It wasn't hard to imagine. He'd have broken Genma's face. He sure as hell wouldn't have continued the easy friendship they seemed to have had over the decades. It wasn't as if he were the only man Anko had taken to her bed, and Genma himself had had his share of partners. But going over it in his mind he realized that Genma was always the last one to leave. He remembered the look in Genma's eyes as he watched her leave, her hand in the back pocket of another man. It was brief, but it was there, and he'd never put the pieces together.

"How's work been going?" she asked, breaking him from his thoughts.

"Good," he said honestly. "It's kind of like being in a mystery novel."

She laughed. It was a balm to his spirit. "You don't miss losing limbs?"

"Or eyes? No, not really."

When they got to Atsuko and her family his sister's eyes lit up. "Look at the two of you," she said with a warm smile.

"Now your prodding makes perfect sense," he said flatly as he gave her a half-hearted glare.

"Yeah," Sakura joined him. "You knew that was going to happen."

"Guilty," she said with a satisfied smirk. "If I hadn't meddled, nothing would have happened. You're welcome."

"May we borrow a blanket, please?" he asked, deciding to drop his accusations.

She chuckled as she went to a stack of them near a tree. "There'll be games starting up in about an hour."

Just before the games started up, Sarada and Chie showed up. Kakashi's ninken had joined them by that time and Chie's eyes lit up. "Are they yours?" she asked Kakashi with wide eyes.

"Yeah," Kakashi said. "Hey guys, meet Chie, she's Sakura's new daughter. Chie, these are Pakkun, Bull, Urushi, Shiba, Bisuke, Akino, Uhei, and Guruko." He pointed to each dog as he named them.

"Hi, Chie," the dogs said in unison.

Chie's mouth fell open as she stifled a squeal with her hands. "They talk!"

"They'll be your best friends if you rub their bellies," Kakashi whispered behind his hand.

Sakura was chuckling when he turned back to her and she shook her head, trying and failing to look disappointed as she asked, "Is it possible for you to try not to become all of my children's favorite person?"

"No." It felt good to tease her the way they used to before. Natural.

OoO*OoO*OoO

As the sun started to dip towards the horizon, Sarada walked up to Kakashi while they were all looking around at the booths. "You know," she whispered, "I hear that the sunset is beautiful if you go up on that ridge over there." She pointed and gave a very intentional glance at the back of her mother' head, her eyebrows raised. "Hint, hint," she added just in case he was too dense to get it.

"I don't know."

"It's a  _walk_ ," she said flatly. "Come on, I'll watch Chie for y'all." Before he could respond, Sarada sped up to meet her new sister, taking her small hand and making some kind of excuse to their mother. With a quick glance over her shoulder at Kakashi, she was off with Chie to look at the puppies that were playing in a small yard.

"I get the feeling we're being set up," Sakura said when Kakashi walked up beside her.

"She means well."

"Yeah, I suppose she does."

"She wants me to take you on a walk up there," he said, pointing his thumb towards the ridge.

"Do you want to?" The corners of her lips quirked upwards by the faintest degree. She liked the idea.

"I wouldn't mind."  _I'd love to._

"Come on, then," she said, leading the way. He followed into step beside her, two feet of air between them as they walked in silence, but it wasn't uncomfortable. So often before all of their insanity had started, they'd walk that way, just enjoying the presence of another person. So much about their relationship had been comfortable then. He hadn't fully appreciated it then because it didn't come with the labels or thrills he'd expected it to.

Now, though, as they sat on the edge of the cliff, their legs dangling over, he treasured every second. The amber light pouring over her. The small smile. The scent of her wrapping around him on the breeze. She shivered. He shrugged out of his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders.

"Thanks," she said, a faint blush on her cheeks as she looked down at her hands, that were folded on her lap, lost in the sleeves of his jacket.

"You're welcome." He forced himself to turn away from her, watching the plethora of colors that were painting the sky.

"Kakashi?" Her voice was soft.

He turned back to her, but her gaze was locked on him. "What are we doing?"

"Watching a sunset." It was cautious, not flippant.

"Do you really still love me?"

It felt as if at any moment the cliff would give way beneath him. This was the moment. He could deny it and be done with her, or he could lay his heart bare for her to shatter it. "I do." He drew a deep breath. "And that scares me, because you could do better. I don't want you to, but I should."

Her gaze dropped. "The truth is, I still love you too. I don't feel like I really know you anymore, but I want to."

He reached out his hand and she met him halfway, lacing their fingers together. "So where does that leave us?"

"What about supper Friday night?"

"I can cook."

"Chie would appreciate that," Sakura said with a giggle.

"We could play board games."

"Like old times," she smiled the easiest smile he'd seen her wear in almost a year.

"It won't be exactly like that." He looked down at their hands. "You know, when Sarada found it about the breakup, she brought me whiskey." He gave a single chuckle. "I'd been sober two weeks, but it was still eye-opening. I put you both through a lot that you shouldn't have had to go through."

"At least you weren't a mean drunk..." Sakura started, but he shook his head.

"Doesn't make it right. That little girl could have followed my footsteps, and it all would have been on me." He drew a deep breath, making slow circles in in her palm with with his thumb. "I want to do things right this time, with you, Chie, and Sarada."

"I'd like that."

With his free hand he tucked her hair behind her ear. "Would you mind if I kissed you?" he asked, his voice low and his eyes locked on hers.

"I'd like that," she repeated, softer, full of longing.

His lips met hers with all the reverence of a worshiper kissing an idol. He'd known what it was to lose this goddess, and he wouldn't repeat his mistakes. Her fingers on his neck were fire, burning away all the hurt like incense. When she let out a small moan against his lips, it was a hymn. 

This time he would do whatever he had to keep her, because he knew what it was to lose her.


	30. Chapter 30

Genma lay in the hospital bed, watching Anko sleep in the early morning light. She was beautiful, without makeup, her raven hair framing her face. She hadn't left in the week he'd been awake.

He wished he could believe her when she said she loved him, that the feather-light touches she put on what was left of his face were genuine signs that she could be satisfied with what was left of him. But he knew her. She meant well, she cared, but he'd  _never_  been enough for her. Not even before. It was laughable to think he would be now. In a few months, maybe a year, the pity would wear off.

He ran his tongue over the back of the senbon between his teeth. The pain of it was oddly comforting. One normal thing in a world turned upside down. He remembered the argument he'd had with the medic.

" _We simply can't give you a weapon," she'd said in her end-of-the-shift weary voice._

_"I'm a goddamn fuckin' ninja, every fuckin' thing in this room is a weapon!" he'd shouted back at her._

_A half hour later, Sakura appeared with a faint grin as she held out her hand, a long, silver needle between her fingers. "If you kill yourself with this, I will resurrect you and make that explosion look like a picnic and Ibiki seem like a pre-school teacher. You hear me?"_

_"Yes, ma'am," he drawled, putting it between his teeth._

It was almost funny hearing the threats come from her lips. Sakura was sweet. Anko was bitchy. Somehow the explosion fucked everything in the universe up.

The night before he'd convinced Anko to go back to work. Or, at least, he hoped he had. Because he could not take another day of her tenderness. As a teenager he would have happily given up the leg he'd lost to have her undivided attention. In their thirties, he would have relished the fact that they'd spent two straight nights in the same room. But now? It wasn't exactly the same thing.

It was pity.

That was the best he'd get from anyone for the rest of his life. Because he it wasn't like he could keep on as a ninja after this. But what else could ex-nin do? When Anko had started nagging him about retiring, he'd thought about teaching at the Academy with her, but with a face like his... He glared at his reflection in the window. He'd never seen anything that hideous in his life. It churned his stomach.

His fingers went up to the bumpy skin of his jaw. He had to give some credit to the medical team. His entire body wasn't constantly in pain anymore. Now, though, he could barely feel anything. The fingers of his right hand felt as if they were touching something dead. Something putrid. Smooth and cold and numb.

"Fuck," he muttered.

If he had any iota of luck left at all, she would leave for work in an hour. When she did, he'd break his word to Sakura. He felt slightly bad for it. She'd tried damned hard. But in the end, Kakashi would be there to pick up the pieces. He was good at that.

OoO*OoO*OoO

"Are you sure?" Anko asked for the tenth time that morning.

"Yeah." Genma forced a smile that he was absolutely certain didn't have the same effect it used to. "You need some fresh air, and don't forget to pick up something decent to eat before you get back here."

She chuckled, unease written in her eyes, but she leaned down and kissed what was left of his lips. "I'll see you this afternoon. I love you."

How many years had he waited to hear those words roll of her lips? She turned to go, but he called after her, "Hey, I love you too, babe. Don't forget that today." She smiled.  _God, she's beautiful. Beautiful and wild and strong._

_She'll land on her feet._

He rolled the senbon to the other side of his mouth, waiting as the seconds ticked. She needed to be at the Academy. Iruka would be there for her.

**Tick. Tick. Tick.**

_She's not going to forgive you for this._ He scowled as he looked down at what remained of his left hand.  _Better now, while she's still got some good memories than in years from now when she resents the useless fuck I've become._

**Tick. Tick. Tick.**

_His mind went back to when he was six or seven. One night, his first step-father had shown up at the house drunk as Genma was on his way to bed. "Do you want supper?" his mother had asked his step-father. "I already put it up, but I can reheat it."_

_"Ya know, a good wife would've left it warm," his step-father's words slurred together. "A good wife would have had that little bastard to bed before I got home too."_

_"Genma," his mother said softly, her eyes darting to him for the briefest moment. "Go to bed, honey."_

_"I love you, woman, but you baby that little asshole and he's never going to fuckin' make it past the Academy!"_

_"Please don't talk to him like that," his mother's voice was so small._

_He remembered his step-father backhanding his mother, her frail body falling to the floor just before his step-father kicked her in the face._

_He remembered lunging at the man, who was easily six times his size._

_The last thing he remembered was flying through the air and hitting a wall. When he woke, his step-father was gone and his mother was crying as she picked up the shards of a vase off the ground. She was such a tiny woman, with a timid heart-shaped face that was now rapidly turning shades of pink and purple. Her brown eyes were almost swollen shut._

_"Mama, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I couldn't... I couldn't stop him," he remembered crying as he pushed himself up off the sofa she'd laid him on._

_"Shhh." She'd gone to him, wrapping her arms around him as she whispered, "Just promise me something. Promise me you'll never turn your anger on the woman you love. You'll never hurt her. Don't tell her you love her; show it to her. Words, they don't mean anything without actions."_

**Tick. Tick. Tick.**

_He'd been on his way to meet Raido on a summer afternoon when he'd felt his wallet slide out of his back pocket. He whipped around in time to see a girl with raven hair running down the dusty alley. "Damn it," he'd muttered under his breath as he'd chased after her. He watched her run, studying her before he put a well aimed senbon into her spine, temporarily paralyzing her._

_Plucking the wallet out her hand, he took in her ragged clothes. The only thing on her that wasn't painfully thin was her face, which would have been cherubic if it weren't for the death glare she had fixed on him._

_"What gives, kid?" he asked gently taking the senbon from her back. "You hungry?"_

_"No!" she spat, but at the same moment her stomach growled._

_He took in her second-hand ninja gear. "Can't steal. Can't lie. Kid, you're goin' into the wrong profession."_

_"My name's not kid! It's Anko!"_

_He chuckled. "Okay, Anko, wiggle your feet. Get the chakra flowing again. Yeah, that's right." He offered her his hand, hoisting her to her feet and putting his arm around her waist to support her as he lead her back to the main road._

_"Where are you taking me?!"_

_"Eat," he said. "You like ramen?"_

T **ick. Tick. Tick.**

_"Did you hear? They found Anko," Kurenai whispered to him, her gaze studying him._

_"Oh," was all he'd said, but his mind had been reeling. He hadn't trusted his friend's sensei, and as rumors began to pour in of Orochimaru's experiments worry had morphed into fear for her and hatred of him. It was only compounded by the fact that there was nothing he could do about it. He was bound to the village and the rule of the Hokage, who'd adamantly refused to let his team track her when she left willingly. He cursed himself for not having been able to keep her from that. She was just a kid, after all, she needed looking after._ _"Know where she's at?"_

_"I don't know, they brought her to the hospital, but I heard they let her go."_

_He waited fifteen minutes before he tossed his share of the money for their dango bill on their table and walked out the shop. It was strange how even five years after she'd left, his feet still had the path to her apartment memorized. She was standing on her balcony, her brown eyes staring at Hokage Rock. At least he thought it was her. She was wearing an oversized t-shirt that did little to hide the fact that she wasn't a kid any more._

_Her gaze turned to him slowly and an altogether foreign glint flickered in her eyes as she smiled. With a single, fluid motion she bounded over the edge of the balcony and landed in front of him in a sweeping bow. Standing up, she smoothed her shirt out, accentuating every new curve she had before she looked back at him with a smile that could only be described as predatory. "How's it going, Shiranui?" she purred as she closed the gap between them, sliding her fingernails down the side of his face. "You're looking positively delectable."_

**Tick. Tick. Tick.**

_They were drinking at The Broken Cup because Hatake actually would join him there, unlike the rest of the old gang who preferred sweets to hard liquor. His friend had been unusually quiet, even for him. When Anko walked into the barroom Hatake didn't turn, but he tensed at the sound of her voice. She had that effect on some people._

_She didn't go to Genma, even though her eyes were locked on him, almost daring him. She wrapped her arms around Hatake's neck as she leaned against him, pressing her breasts into his back. Genma remembered thinking, "What the fuck?" but he'd said nothing, refusing to respond even as confusion and rage pooled in his gut._

_"Hey there, Hatake," she purred into his ear, her eyes still locked on Genma. "Thanks for the other day."_

_Genma said nothing, but gave a questioning glance to his normally cool headed friend who was now sweating, guilt and fear written in his one visible eye. It wasn't like Hatake was the first guy she'd cheated on him with, but he was the closest. What the hell did she want from him?_

_"You wanna go make me moan your name again?" she whispered in Hatake's ear._

_To his credit, he shook his head quickly._

_She tossed her head back and laughed. "You worried about Genma?" she asked him. "Don't be. It doesn't bother you, does it, babe?"_

_Every part of him wanted to flip the table and slam his fist in Hatake's face, but he just shrugged. "Knock yourselves out," he said around the senbon. "Ain't like I've got any say in what you do."_

_"I-I have to leave," Kakashi said, almost stumbling over the chair as he made a quick exit._

_Anko laughed as she watched him go. "That kid needs to loosen up a little," she said to Genma as she walked around the table and sat down on his lap. "You're not mad, are you?" she whispered against his neck._

_She smelled like sugar and roses. Like something innocent and delicate._

_He ran his rough fingers up her smooth arm. "I'm not mad." Hurt. Depressed. Jealous. Yes, but not mad at anyone but himself. If he could just figure out what it was she wanted, he'd give it to her. When he asked, though, she'd just laughed and said, "You."_

**Tick. Tick. Tick.**

_She hadn't answered his calls in two days. She hadn't shown up at work in four days. He knocked on the door, but she didn't answer. Banging on the door again, he said, "Anko, I know you're in there! Unlock the door or I'll pick the damned lock!"_

_For a moment he though he would have to, but then the door clicked and she opened it by a fraction. Her face was swollen and bruised. Tears flooded her eyes._

_"What the fuck happened to you?" he asked softly. She worked at the Academy, for fuck's sake._

_She sniffed. "It was stupid."_

_"Well, it looks goddamned fuckin' stupid from where I'm standing, but I asked you what the hell happened?" His eyes stung as he raised his hand gently to run his fingers over one of the few unbruised areas of her face._

_"Last week... I went out with this guy, and..." she sighed. "He saw me at The Broken Cup with this other guy. So, he comes up to me all sweet and asks me to go home with him, and of course I didn't think anything about it, but... He was apparently pretty pissed."_

_"What was this guy's name?" Genma could barely keep his voice even._

_"Doi," Anko said, barely a whisper._

_He ran his memory down until he said, "Blonde, works in ANBU?"_

_"Yeah."_

_He turned and went for the door._

_"Genma, where are you going?"_

_"Have a talk with him," he said._

_She grabbed his wrist, but he shook her off. "He's in ANBU!" she pleaded._

_"I don't fuckin' care if he's god himself!" Genma spat before he turned back to her, his voice kinder as he gently cradled her chin in his hand. "I know you. You wouldn't let someone do this to you without putting up a hell of a fight, but... I can't stand back and let people hurt you. You understand that, right?" His eyes searched hers hoping for a flicker of understanding, but she'd been hurt so much in her life. Maybe she didn't._

_He'd wound up with a full set of broken ribs and a shattered orbital socket, but when he'd finally managed to paralyze the bastard, Genma had insured that he'd never lay a hand on another woman ever again. It had been worth the month of lock-up to shatter all the bones in Doi's arms and leave him laying there unable to move or cry out. He heard it had taken them three days to find him. He wasn't ANBU material any more._

**Tick. Tick. Tick.**

_He remembered the second the bomb went off. Two thoughts went through his mind. The first was, "Well, fuck." The second was, "Who's going to take care of Anko?"_

_He wished he would have died. That he'd have never seen the pity in her eyes. It was bad enough that he'd never been enough for her. At least she always knew where she could turn to when she needed help. He was the one who'd seen her break down. He was the one who'd seen her when she was sick. He was the one she came to when she was haunted by memories that threatened to drown her. He was the one who'd seen the scars she'd inflicted on herself and the ones that others, dearer to her, had left._

_When she was strong, she was everyone else's._

_When she was weak, she was his._

_But now he couldn't protect her anymore.  
_

"What the fuck good am I?" he muttered to himself as he drew his senbon out of his mouth. He considered it for a moment as the sunlight glimmered off of it. A quick strike in the right place in his heart would stop it.

His new step-dad was a decent guy. He'd take care of his mom.

And Anko had friends who'd take care of her. Some for her emotional needs. Others for the physical. She'd be fine.

Kakashi and Raido had lost enough friends that they'd survive one more. 

He held the senbon at arm's length, aiming it for his chest as he stared out at the blue sky.

**Tick. Tick...**

**Knock. Knock. Knock.**

"Of all the fuckin'..." Genma muttered, the senbon falling harmlessly from his fingertips onto the blanket. "Come in," he called.


	31. Chapter 31

Kakashi pushed the hospital door open. There was a faint glimmer of surprise in his friend's eyes as he lifted the senbon to his teeth. "Mornin'," Genma said.

"Morning," Kakashi said, holding out a bag of breakfast. "The food here sucks."

Genma gave a single chuckle. "Tell me about it. You just missed Anko."

"Didn't come to see her," Kakashi said as he pulled up a chair by the side of Genma's bed and placed the food on his table. "That stuff's better hot, you know."

"You brought enough for both of us?"

Pulling things out of the bag and moving the table where Genma could get it, Kakashi said, "Eating, like drinking, is better done with other people."

"When'd you get so damned philosophical?"

"I read it on a fortune cookie." Kakashi smirked.

"You're such a dork." Genma said, looking down at the plate of bacon, pancakes, and fruit before he lifted a forkful with his good hand. "Oh, god, this is so fuckin' good."

Kakashi chuckled. "Thanks."

The ate in silence after that, Kakashi trying to put together the things he was planning to say to his friend. How does a person go about apologizing for not realizing that fucking the woman his friend is in love with was a bad thing? I'm sorry I'm too much of a socially inept idiot to realize that was wrong? Genma wiped his mouth, laying the napkin on the table before he started picking his teeth with his senbon. "Not that I'm not enjoyin' this, but Raido's gonna be pissed if you're late for work, ya know?"

"I've got today off."

"And you thought you'd drop in to see your gimp friend. How fuckin' sweet."

His words snapped across Kakashi's spirit. "Quit it," Kakashi said, his eyes narrowing slightly.

"Quit what?" There was a challenge in Genma's voice, despite the smirk hadn't left his lips.

"Quit calling yourself a gimp."

"Or what?" Genma scoffed. "You'll kick my ass? You'd really beat up a worthless cripple?"

"If you were a worthless cripple I wouldn't, but as you're not, I'm seriously considering it."

"Fuck you!" The smile was gone.

"Dammit all," Kakashi muttered. "I actually came here to apologize."

"What the hell for?"

"For having sex with Anko."

"Which time exactly?!"

"All of them," Kakashi said. "I didn't... Damn it, I didn't know the two of you actually loved each other."

"Then you're the dumbest fuckin' genius on the planet," Genma muttered.

"You said you didn't care."

"What the hell else did you expect me to do?! Beg her not to sleep around?! Fuck that! But you!?" He pointed the forefinger of his damaged hand at Kakashi. "You should have fuckin' known better!"

"I know, and I'm sorry."

"I don't want your goddamned apologies!"

"Then what do you want?" The was no anger in Kakashi's voice, instead, a pleading as if he would give anything, right up to his own life, to make things right.

Genma drew a deep breath, his fiery gaze dropping to the blanket. The damaged hand ran over the stump of the missing leg as he pursed his lips. "I don't fuckin' know anymore, man. I don't fuckin' know." A tear rolled down his cheek and he brushed it away angrily. "I don't wanna be stuck in this damned bed anymore. I want my body back. Fuck! I'd settle for things being exactly the way they were before... God, that makes me one pathetic fuck, doesn't it?"

"No, it doesn't. It makes you human." Kakashi leaned his elbows on his knees leaning forward. "Sakura told me they'll be able to repair most of the damage, probably in less time than they originally thought..."

"Most of the damage doesn't get me my job back!" Genma snapped.

"There's plenty of work besides active duty."

"Like what?" Genma scoffed. "Investigations? You and I both know I don't have the damned brain for that shit. Teaching?" He turned his face, giving Kakashi a twisted smile. "I look like a fuckin' monster, man. I don't think even Sakura's skilled enough to fix that."

"So you're going to what? Give up?"

"I've fucking thought about it!" he spat back. His breath caught, his eyes growing wide and Kakashi knew without a doubt that he'd both meant what he'd said and not meant to admit to it.

Standing up, Kakashi walked quickly to the closet.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Genma asked as he watched Kakashi pull a wheelchair out.

"You said you wanted out of the bed," Kakashi said as he locked the wheels, then set to lowering the bed frame. "You're getting out this damned bed. Sit up."

"What the fuck!? I can't leave this room!"

"Like hell you can't!" Kakashi growled. "Now are you going help me or am I going have to drag your lazy ass out of bed?"

Grumbling he sat, rest stiffened muscles and overly tight skin protesting against the movement. "You're a fuckin' asshole, you know that?"

"Yeah, I do," Kakashi said as he put his hands under Genma's arms and helped him stand and maneuver into the chair.

"I'm not fuckin' having people stare at me," Genma protested as Kakashi unlocked the wheels.

"Then it's a damned good thing you're topnotch shinobi, isn't it?" Kakashi said as he leaned down. "You can still do a camouflage jutsu, can't you?"

"I'm not fuckin' sure," Genma said, looking down at the missing fingers of his left hand.

"Well try, you damned coward," Kakashi challenged him, a ghost of a smile on the corners of his lips as Genma scowled at him and did it just to spite him, disappearing instantly. "Look at that," Kakashi said flatly as he opened the door and backed them out of it.

"Where are you going with that wheelchair?" one of the nurses asked him.

"On an errand for Director Uchiha," he said with a smile and a little wave. "Can't keep her waiting." He hit the elevator button, grateful the lift was empty.

"You're gonna look like a nutcase pushing an 'empty' wheelchair around," Genma muttered as the doors closed.

"Wouldn't be the first time, would it?" Kakashi chuckled.

"Why the fuck are you doing this?" his voice was tired.

"Because you're one of the few old friends I've got left. I may have fucked that up beyond fixing, but you know me. I'm stubborn. I'm sure as hell not going to sit back and let you kill yourself."

"You think you could really stop me?" he asked.

It felt like a knife had been shoved into his heart. "No," he admitted. "You're the only one who can do that, but I've never known you to give up so damned easily."

"You think this is easy?" There was a scoff.

The elevator opened and Kakashi leaned down again, whispering near Genma's ear. "No, but I think it'll get easier eventually. Everything does."

OoO*OoO*OoO

They were sitting in the gardens two hours later when Sakura walked across the lawn towards them. "Kakashi." She smiled as she turned to the seemingly empty wheelchair. "Genma. You have the whole floor thinking you've escaped, you know that?"

He chuckled. "Well, isn't that sorta what I did, Doc? Sunlight's supposed to be curative, isn't it?"

"Not for burn victims," Sakura said flatly. "I'd actually gone to your room because I need your help with something."

"Name it." He grinned at her, fully aware she had no idea he was doing it. It amused him that she'd grown into such a strong-willed little lady, especially when she talked to him and Kakashi as if they were disobedient schoolboys rather than men with more than a decade of experience on her.

"My acupuncturist called in sick with the flu and I have a surgery scheduled for tomorrow morning. I'm assuming you know how to use that thing in your mouth as something other than a toothpick."

"I know a few things, but I ain't no medic."

"Do you know how to paralyze a person temporarily?"

"Well, yeah..."

"Good, we need to get back to your room, because if you don't take this, I'm going to have to reschedule and I would really rather if it went ahead as planned." She turned and walked towards the hospital.

Kakashi just shrugged as he went to unlock the wheelchair, but Genma called after her, "I don't know anything about surgery!"

"Luckily I do," she called over her shoulder. "I've got the charts for you in the room. Fourteen year old with a brain tumor. I can't put him to sleep, and I can't have medics manipulating his chakra. It's too delicate a procedure. I need him awake and able to respond. Think you can do that?"

"On a kid?"

She stopped short, marching back to him. She put her hands on the ends of the armrests, leaning in so that she was only a few inches away from his face. He could feel her breath on his face, her teal eyes locked on his somehow. "Fourteen is hardly a kid. You told me once that you were the best damned senbon wielder in the village. Now were you just talking out your ass or were you being serious?"

"I... I was being serious."

"Good," she said as she stood. "Then you're going to help me with this, because you owe me." She grinned at him.

He couldn't argue with that.

"Oh," Sakura said, leaning down again. "And clean up your fucking mouth when you talk to this kid, okay?"

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura and Genma were sitting in chairs on either side of his bed, using the expanse as a giant desk for the papers and diagrams they were going over. "I'm telling you, Doc, the needle needs to go in that direction, I don't care what your textbook says. Put it in straight and the kid'll still be able to move his fingers. Angle in a hair and bam," he said.

"Hi," Anko said warmly as she dropped a kiss on Genma's cheek. "You two going over the next surgeries."

"Not exactly," Genma said with the most earnest smile she'd seen him wear since the accident. "I'm gonna help her with a surgery tomorrow."

Anko choked. "You're going to what?"

"My acupuncturist called in sick, and we don't have another trained one working here. He's doing me a big favor." Sakura said.

"That's great," Anko said, forcing the shock not to show in her face. She could have hugged Sakura. There had been one nagging question that she'd been unable to answer. It had hung over her head like a weight ever since he'd first uttered it while he was morphine-drunk after a particularly long surgery. "What the fuck am I good for anymore, Anko?" She'd never seen him cry before that day, and it brought home exactly how tragic this entire situation was to him.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi was waiting in Sakura's office when she got there. "That was a good thing you did, " he said.

"Hmm, well it wa a stroke of luck. Don't tell him, but I wouldn't have tagged him if I'd have had left options. I've been after the board to train another acupuncturist for three years now. This kid will be dead in two months without the surgery."

"I hope it goes well," he said reaching out and pulling her into an embrace.

"Me too," she mumbled against his chest. There were too many things riding on it for her comfort.

 


	32. Chapter 32

Sakura paced her living room the next morning before the sun had risen. She had no doubt that Genma was fully capable of what she'd asked of him; there was no way she'd have put the life of a fourteen year old kid in his hands otherwise. It would be a lie, though, to say she wasn't terrified. She'd meant what she told Kakashi; if there would have been any acupuncturists in town other than the seedy ones that ran shops out of their houses, she would have gone with them.

It was an odd intersection of fate. Most active duty shinobi held senbon in mild disdain; the weapons were rarely capable of killing a person; so naturally, few ninja got truly skilled with them. Medics didn't often use them because they locked a patient's chakra in place, making it harder to manipulate it. Sakura had a rudimentary understanding of them, but with all the things on her plate between the Children's Clinic and surgery, she didn't have time to study enough to become proficient. So the hospital was down to one well-trained acupuncturist, Kana Saito, an aging woman who had been on Sakura's case to find a replacement. And then Genma had come in. She knew he as feeling lost and useless, but she couldn't have planned a more perfect juncture than when the call came that Kana wouldn't be in to work for several weeks.

The problem was, if anything went wrong she would never forgive herself. And there were plenty of things that could go wrong. She could botch the surgery. Genma's movements were already hampered by the damage to his skin and muscles, he could accidentally misplace a needle causing permanent paralysis. Before the explosion his confidence bordered on obscene, but inflated egos were usually fragile. Sakura knew that. If something when wrong, he'd blame himself.

She shook her head, pushing those thoughts away. Not that brain surgery was ever routine, but she was confident that she could do this successfully. With a determined nod, she grabbed her bag and headed out into the still dark street.

OoO*OoO*OoO

"Is this really necessary?" Genma asked as Sakura tied the surgical gown behind his back.

"Be glad I'm not making you wear a mask," she said cheerily. "You know, you could at least take the senbon out your teeth."

"Helps me think," he drawled with a lopsided grin. It fell a moment later, though. "You sure this kid's blind?"

She gave him a flat look. "I wouldn't lie to you about something like that. The tumor has been pressing on his optic nerves for the last several years. His family is from the countryside and the doctor they took him to assumed the gradual vision loss was an eye condition. It wasn't until he started passing out that they brought him to Konoha. But yes, he's been completely blind for a year now."

Genma drew a deep breath and nodded. She had noticed the way he tensed up whenever they crossed people on their way to the OR. People didn't mean to stare or to look away too quickly, but they did. When she'd gone to meet him that morning, though, Anko had been helping him with his hitai-ate. As he pushed himself in the wheelchair down the hallways, his gaze didn't fall once. It was as if he were daring the people they crossed to make something of his appearance.

That was a step in the right direction at least.

OoO*OoO*OoO

Genma steeled his nerves as Sakura opened the door to the operating room. One of the medic's eyes went wide for a brief moment, her gaze turning away quickly. Yeah, I know I'm fugly, but this fugly bastard's about to save the day, he thought as he rolled up to the kid who was sitting in an operating chair, all covered by sheets, his hair already shaved away. He looked younger than fourteen, with big, vacant eyes.

"Good morning, Yu-kun," Sakura said warmly. "I'm just going to go over everything with you one more time so you know what we'll be doing. I've got Genma Shiranui with me..."

"No shit?" the boy said, his mouth falling slack before he pulled himself together. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, ma'am. I mean, really? He's like, a legend. He's been on the Hokage's guard through four of them. Do you know he can deflect a kunai with a senbon. A senbon!"

"I like this kid." Genma couldn't help smirking at Sakura, who looked slightly amused. "Nice to meet you, Yu."

"Well, Genma-san will be doing the acupuncture that will immobilize you and block your pain receptors, so you won't feel anything."

"So freakin' cool," Yu said under his breath.

"Then I'll take off the top of your skull, right here," she said as she traced around his head with her finger. "You'll still be able to talk and I'll ask you questions and to do some things. At times Genma-san will release certain parts of your body so we can be sure you can still move them, but otherwise you won't be able to move. When I cut away the tumor, you won't immediately regain your sight, but a lot of the pain should go away because the pressure won't be there any more. Understand?"

"Yes, ma'am," Yu said.

"Alright, Genma," Sakura said turning to him. "Just tell me what you need."

Genma looked at the table full of surgically cleaned senbon laying before him. "Does the chair he's in raise up?" he asked softly.

"Yes, sir," Sakura said as she went to the levers. "Just tell me when."

"That'll work, thanks," Genma said as the boy's feet were about level with the armrests of his chair. "Okay, Yu, there'll be a little pinch for a moment, but after the first one in each limb you won't feel anything. Let me know if it's working. K?"

"Sure thing."

He'd never paralyzed anyone so willing, but as he carefully placed the needles, he was sure the boy would feel nothing. While he was working they talked. "So, you what do you want to be when you grow up?" Genma asked.

"Well, when I was a kid, I wanted to be a ninja, but you know, there's not a whole lot of call for blind shinobi, is there? And now I'm too old for the Academy, so I started thinking maybe a doctor. We could use another one in our village."

"That'd be a better job than being a ninja; trust me. It's not nearly as glamorous as the books make it out to be."

"Really?"

"Imagine being crouched down in mud for three days straight without sleep waiting for a pack of bandits that may or may not show up along a route. That's 90% of the job."

"Serious?"

"Well, 90% may be an exaggeration. Let's go with sixty. Then there's getting stabbed, burned, blown up, watching the people you love die. Yeah, it's not a job I'd suggest to anyone."

"So why'd you go into it?"

Genma pursed his lips as he carefully placed another needle. "Because I loved someone who needed protecting and I wasn't strong enough. Then it just kind of became the only thing I was really good at. But you've got a lot of potential. Sakura was telling me you're a genius. You ought to use that to do something good in the world."

OoO*OoO*OoO

The surgery only lasted an hour and half and was a complete success. When Yu went back to recovery, Sakura leaned down and wrapped her arms around Genma's shoulders. "Thank you," she said, relief making her muscles slack as she stood up again. "That kid's going to have a long life thanks to you."

"I didn't do that much," Genma said, rolling his head to pop his neck.

"We've actually been looking for another acupuncturist. Ours wants to retire. I can't speak for the whole board, but after what I saw today, I'm pretty sure you'd be a shoe-in if you want the job."

"I don't know. A medic?"

Sakura scowled. "What's wrong with being a medic?"

For a moment, he didn't answer, his fingers running over the edge of the stainless steel tool table. "Talking with a blind kid is one thing, but... Have you seen the way people look at me?"

Sakura pulled up a stool and sat beside him. "So what's the plan? Hide out in your apartment after you leave here?"

"No, I just... I guess you think I'm a fucking coward too, don't you?" He leaned his elbows in his knees as he hung his head.

"No, I think you're adapting to something new. That takes time, but I also think you're selling other people short."

"Whaddya mean?"

"You're assuming they think you look like a monster. Your words, not mine. But really, you just look different. Different always draws the eye. People can't help that. At the end of the day, though, most people care more about what's inside a man than what's on the outside. You're still the best damned senbon wielder in this village. You're still Genma Shiranui. The explosion didn't take that from you."

He looked at her with a lopsided grin. "I am, huh?"

"And you're still cocky as hell." She laughed as she gently pushed his shoulder. "Come on, you need to go tell Anko you saved a kid's life."

He didn't move, though. "Can I ask you something, Doc? Professionally?"

"Sure."

"You think she means it? When she says all of this," he gestured to his body, "doesn't bother her."

"I think Anko's a pretty straightforward person. If she says something, she means it."

He nodded. "She said she didn't know I loved her."

"Did you ever tell her you did?"

"Well, no, but for fuck's sake it's not that hard to put two and two together. I mean, words don't mean all that much in the end."

"They do to some people," Sakura said with a smile. "You know, I do couple's counseling. If you're uncomfortable with me, there are other doctors here. I know you're not any more fond of shrinks than Kakashi, but I have to put that out there. It wouldn't hurt you two to get some things cleared up."

Genma scoffed as he started for the door. "From where I'm sittin' I'd say Hatake's pretty damn fond of shrinks. Or, at least, pink haired ones."

She rolled her eyes.

"But I'll consider the counseling. Just don't expect me to get all mushy and shit."

"Never."

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sakura felt light as she walked back home. Things with Genma were looking up. As she opened the door to her house, she was greeted by the smell of garlic chicken and the sound of Chie laughing. Kakashi was at the stove, wearing her pink frilly apron, and Chie was on the floor, piled up with all nine of his ninken.

"Mom!" Chie squealed as she pushed herself up and hurried over to Sakura, wrapping her in a hug. "They are so cute! Kakashi said Bisuke can sleep over if it's okay with you. Please say yes."

She chuckled as she glanced over at a sheepish looking Kakashi. "I'm having puppy sleepovers now, am I?"

"He's very well behaved," Kakashi said, trying and failing to look solemn.

"Yeah, I'm housebroken and everything," Bisuke piped up. "The Boss bathed us all yesterday."

"Fine," Sakura relented, giggling as Chie hugged her again before she went back to the dogs, promising all the others that they would have their own turns.

"You are the worst," Sakura whispered to Kakashi as she walked up to him, tiptoeing to kiss his cheek.

"You love me."

"Yes, yes I do," she said chuckling. Sniffing, she sighed. "If Investigations don't pan out, I suggest you open a restaurant."

"That," he said as he held a spoon up to her lips for her to taste, "would take the fun out of it. How did the surgery go?"

She swallowed with a small moan of pleasure. "Perfectly. The patient's already starting to see shadows again. I was able to get the whole tumor out. And, I think Genma's going to take the job."

"You know, you probably saved his life twice."

"That's good, but I didn't recommend him to the board to save him. We need someone with his skill set."

"That's even better. He doesn't want anyone's pity."

"Who would?" she asked as she reached around him and stole a green bean, popping it in her mouth with a satisfied smirk before he could object.

OoO*OoO*OoO

That night, Kakashi and Sakura sat on the sides of Chie's bed, all his ninken laying on the floor as he read her one of Sarada's old storybooks. In the soft glow of her lamp, he relished the feeling of things regained. He watched as Sakura leaned down and gently kissed Chie's forehead and he called the other seven dogs to follow him, Bisuke curled up next to the little girl.

As he followed Sakura down the hallway, his fingers went up to the ring on its chain around his neck.  _Soon_ , he thought with a fond smile.

"So," Sakura said as she halted in the foyer, toeing the carpet at the foot of the stairs.

Every part of his being wanted to take her upstairs to the bedroom he knew was there, but into which he'd never been invited. He pushed the thoughts away. "So, I ought to clean up the dishes."

"I'll get that," Sakura said, taking his hand in hers. "You cooked, after all. It's only fair. Umm, why don't we go sit in the living room?"

He looked at the sofa, the one he knew smelled like her. "Actually," he shifted his weight, forcing himself to look at her eyes and not her lips, "I ought to be going home. I- need to feed the boys."

"We're okay, Boss," Pakkun offered.

Kakashi glared down and the pug looked away before hanging his head. "Why don't you guys go on ahead," Kakashi said, hurrying to the door and opening it for them. "I'll be home in a little bit." He almost sighed against the door as he closed it behind them. There went that excuse.

"Are you okay?" Sakura was almost giggling.

 _Of course she finds this amusing_... He scratched along his jawline, wondering vaguely how long it would take to get used to feeling a short beard rather than a tight mask. "I- well. Um, I'm not sure what to do."

At that Sakura did burst out into a peal of giggles. "Come on," she said as she pulled him into the living room. "You know what I found the other day?" she asked as she went to the bookcase. She pulled down a small pink photo album. "I started this when Sarada and I moved back to the village," she said as she sat on the sofa and patted the seat next to her.

He sat on the very edge, looking down at the pages of the book that she opened on his knee. There was a photo of Boruto's first birthday, with baby Sarada and Sakura and Kakashi besides them. Sakura flipped through the pages. Kakashi pushing Sarada on a swing at the park. Them in the middle of a snowball fight. Sarada's Academy Entrance ceremony with a shot of Sakura and Kakashi standing side by side in the crowd. Who had taken that one again?

"I realized," Sakura said softly, "that you were always there. In almost every single moment that mattered, you were there." Her hand covered his and when his gaze met hers she smiled.

"I hope we make a lot more memories," he said.

"We will," Sakura said as she ran her cool fingers through his hair and pulled him towards her. Her lips met his chastely, but it lit a fire inside him. He could smell the desire on her and it almost drove him crazy, but he promised himself he would let her lead. When she broke the kiss, he leaned his forehead against hers.

"I should go home," he said trying to hide the regret in his voice.

"Chie still doesn't sleep very well," Sakura said, and he heard the regret in her voice as well. "That would probably be for the best."

He pursed his lips. "I miss waking up next to you."

"I miss falling asleep next to you," she admitted with a grin.

"Baby steps, though, right?"

"Baby steps."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  Okay, ladies and gents, I have a rather sad announcement. Today's the last day of my yearly vacation from paid writing gigs. The story's not over but as I've got a 3,000 word minimum I need to meet to make my deadlines and meeting deadlines means a happy landlord and fancy things like food and lights, I'm going to go out on a limb and say I'll probably only be updating once a week from here on out until it's finished. (I usually take Wednesdays off.) I had really meant to have it done in the month, but what was supposed to be a rather simple story kind of spiraled out of control. (This, my dears, is what happens when we don't have an outline, lol.) Anyway, I said that all to say this: Please don't get discouraged that it's kind of slow coming from here on out. I love you all. This story has become my favorite personal project to date. It will get finished. 
> 
> Also, to celebrate the ending of the story (Which,  I promise is coming)  I'm going to be holding a little contest. When it's over, I'm going to do a series of five one-shots. Post the pairing you'd like, plus heat level, and a short prompt. I'll pick five and you get your stories. I do any pairings M/F, F/F, M/M, M/F/M, F/F/M, etc. I don't do incest or under-age. Anything else from fluff to erotica is fair game. Start thinking about what you want. ^_^


	33. Chapter 33

Genma was sitting in the shade of a large tree in the gardens, three different medical books spread out over it as he jotted down things in a separate notebook. He looked up when he sensed Sakura walking up to him. "This," he waved his hands over the books, "is giving me fuckin' flashbacks of the Academy."

"Aww, is the big bad Genma Shiranui afraid of tests?" she chuckled as she sat down opposite from him.

"I think I liked you better before I got blown up," he said, laying the pen down. "Please tell me you're here to get me to sign release papers. I miss my bed."

"If you recover as quickly from the next surgery as you did the last, I promise we'll let you go at the end of next week. But I'm actually here because Yu is about to be released, and he wanted to thank you before he left."

Genma drew a long breath as he rolled the senbon to the other side of his mouth. "I don't know, Doc."

"Tests and fourteen-year-old fans. Noted," Sakura said flatly.

"Come on, dammit."

"No, you come on. We don't need an acupuncturist who only wants to work on blind people. He'll be in room 294 until about 1:30." With that she got up and started to walk away.

"Hey, I'll go see him," Genma called after her.

She turned to him with a slight grin. "I knew you would. You're a lot of things, but a coward's not one of them."

He shook his head as he started putting the books into the bag he'd hung on the back of his chair. She'd played him. He'd kind of thought Kakashi was crazy for dating a kid he'd trained, but she obviously wasn't a kid any more.

Even though the door was slightly ajar, he knocked, and a second later there was a scurry of feet in the room and the door opened. "Hey, Shirunai-san!" Yu said, bowing quickly.

"Genma's fine, kid," he said returning the bow.

"Wow! Thanks! That's so cool! You know, the guy's aren't gonna believe you're actually the one that paralyzed me for the surgery." He sat down on the edge of his bed, shaking his head as if he couldn't believe his luck.

"Yeah, well maybe I'll take a vacation to your village when all the stuff around here settles down. Whaddya say?"

"There are some nice hot springs there. Lots of pretty girls." Yu gave him a lopsided grin.

Genma chuckled. "Yeah, I'll leave them to you. Don't tell anyone I told you this," he leaned in and whispered, "but all any man can really handle is one pretty girl at a time, and I've got a really pretty one comin' home in a few hours."

"Well, bring her along too!" Yu said. "My aunt runs an inn and I'll get her to put you up in the best room she's got."

"I may have to do that. Hey, I brought you something." He pulled out a leather pouch and handed it to Yu.

Opening it, the boy's eyes lit up. "Serious?" he asked as he pulled out a kunai, a couple shuriken, and a handful of senbon, laying them on the bed with reverence.

"Well, if I'd have known you were leaving so soon, I'd have given them to you earlier so we could've practiced more, but if you're free, I'll go take you outside and show you how to throw 'em. You up for it?"

"Hell yeah!"

OoO*OoO*OoO

"Well," Sakura said as they watched Yu meet the bus in the front of the hospital, "his parents are probably going to hate you for giving him all that stuff, but I think it was sweet."

Genma chuckled. "Everybody oughta know how to defend themselves. It's a crazy ass world out there."

"Was it as bad as you thought it would be?"

"Kid didn't bat an eyelash." He looked up at Sakura suspiciously. "You told him, didn't you?"

"That you survived a blast that would've killed any lesser man? Hell yes. It's all part of the legend. Get with the program."

OoO*OoO*OoO

Anko came in that afternoon balancing a stack of folders and looking fully exasperated. She plopped the paperwork and her bags down on the sofa, then leaned down and kissed Genma's lips. "How's the studying going?" she asked.

"Pretty good," he said, closing the book. "Finals come around already?"

"Worse. Chunin exams," she said with a sigh. "And these are just the applications."

"I got some good news," Genma said, watching her expression as he said the next words, "Doc says I'll probably going home at the end of next week."

Relief. Joy. _She's probably more sick of sleeping on that damned sofa than you are of the hospital bed,_ he chastised himself, but the truth was, he'd gotten used to waking up in the same room as her for the last few months, and he wasn't sure he really wanted to go back to his empty apartment. "I'm sure you'll be happy to sleep in a real bed again."

Her smile faltered slightly, and it gave him a little hope for what he was about to say. "I was actually thinking, what would you say to us moving in together?"

Her eyebrow cocked up. "Two weeks ago it was couple's counseling, now this? You ask me to marry you and I'm going to talk to Sakura about having you committed," she said with a chuckle.

 _Too much. Damn it all._  "Hey, it was just a thought," he said, flipping the book open again.

His mind went back to a conversation he'd had with Sakura a few days before. "Have you ever insisted on  _anything_  with Anko?" she asked as they sat eating lunch together in the gardens.

"Well, no," he'd said. "That's not how relationships are supposed to work."

"Yeah, actually it kind of is," Sakura had said with a chuckle. "I mean, it would be a bad thing if you demanded she do everything you want to do, but you can't just go around acting like you don't care about anything. Because that's what she thinks, you know?"

He pressed his tongue against the underside of the senbon for a moment. "Why don't you want to move in with me?"

"Because I'm a slob and it'd drive you crazy," she said a bit quicker than he'd expected.

"I know how to clean."

"I know," she said pointedly. "Which is why we live in different houses."

"Is that it?"

"Well, no," she said a bit more reluctantly.

"What is it, then?"

She closed her eyes for a minute, leaning her head back as if she were trying to collect all the shreds of evidence that his idea was awful before she spoke again. "Living with men has never worked out well for me," she said softly.

"Well damn, how many other men have you ever lived with?" he chuckled, trying to think of any long term relationships she'd had before.

"Two."

"Two?" And then it hit him. Her father and Orochimaru. Genma had only met her father a couple of times. When he was a kid, her dad seemed like a nice enough guy, but Anko was always running away from home. He'd died in a house fire when Anko was nine. She hadn't mourned his passing. Even though he could never get her to admit why, he had his guesses.

He reached his hand out and ran it down the side of her face, cradling her chin. "Ya know I'd never hurt you, babe."

"Yeah," she said softly. "Just let me think about it, k?"

"Yeah, that's fine," he said. "Want me to help you with those files?"

"And make you flunk your first exam? No," she said with a genuine smile. "You do your work, I'll do mine."

OoO*OoO*OoO

Anko lay awake that night long after Genma had fallen asleep. When she was a little girl, she'd sneak into his bedroom whenever her dad didn't come home straight after work. Sometimes Genma would hide her in the closet to keep his mom from finding her, not that she thought the sweet-natured lady would have minded really. His sheets always smelled nice.

"Won't your dad be pissed that he doesn't know where you are?" he'd asked one night as they lay there, looking up at the starry sky outside his window when she was eight and he was eleven.

She shook her head.

"Mom wouldn't let me out the house for a week... Come to think of it, that'd probably be a good way to avoid having to go to school."

Anko had chuckled at that. "I like school."

"Yeah, well, you're like a genius. I mean, straight As and stuff? You're too damned pretty to be so smart to boot."

She'd rolled over on her belly, studying his face in the moonlight.

He finally glanced at her and gave her a quizzical look. "What're you doing, ya nut job?"

"You really think I'm pretty?"

At that his eyes went wide for a moment as if he'd realized his blunder and he blushed a little as he scooted away from her. "No! I mean, you probably will be. You know, when you grow up and stuff. Like when you're a woman or whatever. Damn it. You know what I mean."

With a huff, she lay back down.  _"No one else will ever love you. No one else will ever see what I see in you."_  She pushed her father's words and the feeling of his oily hands against her skin out of her mind.

"I didn't mean to make you mad." Genma was now the one propped up on his elbow, watching her.

"I'm not mad," she lied. "I'm just tired." And with that she'd rolled onto her side and pretended to fall asleep.

It should have been so easy. They had the keys to each other's apartments. They'd spent so many nights together it felt like second nature listening to the soft puffs of air that would escape his lips every few minutes. They were the lullaby that had put her to sleep many a night as a child, right up until the time she'd decided to go away with her sensei.

Regardless what Genma thought, he'd been the thing that made that decision the hardest. He'd also been the only thing that made going back to the village bearable. But when she'd returned it was as if the world were a vacuum. Her childhood home was a ruin. Her mentor was a fugitive. She, herself, was shunned by so many. As a child, she'd learned the importance of boundaries. She knew what to do to avoid fists and lecherous hands. There were rules. Do not bathe while father is home. Cook food that is neither bad nor too good. If he is twenty minutes late for work, go to the library until it closes and then find a safe place to sleep. She knew, go this far and no farther.

With Orochimaru there were an even more difficult set of rules. Impossible hurdles she could not physically or mentally leap over. But there were still set things that were expected of her, and even if she failed all of them, she knew where she was to exist in the universe.

When she'd returned it was as if she was standing in the middle of an endless prairie. No walls. No landmarks. And it felt as if the ground itself would give way at any moment. So she tested the limits with everyone. Surprisingly almost no one seemed to mind if she were loud, or blunt, or a bit messy.

When Genma had first shown up at her apartment, she'd seen a glimmer of something she knew she could work with in his eyes. Lust. That at least was familiar. He didn't ever tell her he loved her, but his rough hands were gentle. She learned the things he liked and those he didn't in the bedroom. That was something at least.

Then one day, about two months after she was back in Konoha, they'd been out at a bar with some of their friends and a foreign nin had come up to her, flirting. Genma had looked only mildly curious. She felt the need to test the situation. Excusing herself from the table, she'd walked to the exit with the stranger, stopping to look back towards Genma. He raised an eyebrow as the man ran his fingers through Anko's hair, but he did nothing as she turned and walked out the bar. The next day, he hadn't even mentioned it. That was the day she decided he didn't really care what she did.

She tested it out with Leaf Ninja, culminating with her seducing Hatake on a rooftop. Thinking about it in retrospect, it wasn't really seduction. It was dangerously close to rape. He'd been terrified. Actually, he'd been terrified the first few times they'd been together, both of the prospect of sex in general and of Genma finding out specifically.

Eventually, though, they'd all fallen into the step of things. Hatake, she found was a romantic. It was amusing. She'd never really noticed something that he pointed out to her only a few weeks before when she'd been complaining about Genma's suggestion of couple's counseling. "You know, he was always the last one to leave the clubs," he'd said. "I think you kind of owe him."

Maybe she did. But it felt like Sakura had some sort of psychiatric x-ray that would expose all the things she'd kept hidden so long. There were things about her past that she knew he couldn't find out about and still look at her the same way. She could face down death and smile, but the thought of him looking deep into the dark recesses of her was terrifying.

It had been so easy when she'd thought he was happy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N- Guys, I haven't had a Saturday night off in for-ev-er, but what I thought a few days ago was just allergies is a nasty sinus drip and that tends to drive away customers when you're handling things they're drinking soooo, I'm curled up in bed writing. I feel like crud, hopefully my cold-relief-medicine-drunk writing is readable. If it's not, forgive me. I promise Genma and Anko only have one more heavy chapter before their arc is over and Kakashi will come in on the next one.
> 
> Oh, and I made a Genma/Anko playlist, because I always listen to music while writing:
> 
> Sometime Around Midnight- The Airborne Toxic Effect
> 
> Drunken Poet's Dream- Hayes Carll (Yes, it is country. Listen to the lyrics. Tell me this is not Anko.)
> 
> She's Every Woman- Garth Brooks (Yes, this is also country. I can't help it. Genma reminds me of a bull rider I once knew. I think it's the toothpick.)
> 
> Bitch- Meredith Brooks
> 
> Blown Away- Carried Underwood (Yet again, more country... Maybe it's the cold meds.)
> 
> Strong Enough- Sheryl Crow
> 
> And, yeah, so good night, lovies. Thanks for reading. Hopefully I wake tomorrow feeling like a real person.


	34. Chapter 34

The yellow walls of the OR waiting room had become all too familiar in the last months. This particular morning, Anko was angled in one chair with her feet propped up on another one against the wall. She flipped through the chunin applications. It felt like each year the kids applying got a little younger. Seven, she felt was a bit ludicrous, but then she reminded herself that Hatake had made chunin at six.

  
And lost his whole team by thirteen.

  
Years of experience had made her a fan of the new push to train kids early but hold them off of serious missions for as long as possible. Some villages still held with the old patterns, but the Leaf was beginning to prefer waiting until people were at least sixteen to send them into the field.

  
The door opened. Sakura smiled. “Everything went well,” she said. “We were able to attach the new fingers. If his body doesn’t reject them, we’ll be doing the leg in about two months. And it looks like you two will be headed home this evening.”

  
Anko’s mind went to the bags that Genma had insisted they pack the night before. “There’s no way in hell this surgery’s gonna go badly,” he’d said as he was putting clothes into his bag.

  
“So,” she’d asked as she pulled a box off the top shelf of the closet, “are you sure you want me staying at your place tomorrow night?” As the days had gotten closer, he hadn’t seemed as sure as he was at first, but he wouldn’t let on why.

  
“Yeah,” he’d said, but the lopsided grin he gave her didn’t quite reach his eyes. Something was bothering him.

  
She hadn’t pushed the issue, though. Things would come out later,  in the privacy of his house. Or maybe they wouldn’t.

  
“Is he awake yet?” Anko asked Sakura.

  
“I don’t think so. It could take as long as an hour. If he’s in a lot of pain, we’ll keep him for the night. You can go meet him in recovery if you want.”

  
It was kind of strange, the way she’d gotten to know the small corridor that led to the recovery rooms. The nurses there were almost family now. “Morning, Yuki,” she said to the girl manning the desk. “Same room he’s normally in?”

  
“Yup,” Yuki said with a bright smile.

  
Anko pushed back the heavy curtain of room five. Genma’s eyes fluttered half open at the noise. “Who’s it?” he muttered.

  
“It’s just me,” Anko said as she walked up to him, dropping a kiss on his forehead. “How’re you feeling?”

  
He chuckled. “Like I’m swimmin’ in beer.”

  
She shook her head with a single chuckle. “Those meds are real good, huh?”

  
“The best.” His words slurred together as he held up his bandaged left hand, now with all five fingers again. “Look at tha’,” he wiggled them slightly with a chuckle. “I can flip people off with both hands again.”

  
“One of the miracles of modern medicine. Looks like we’ll be camping out at your place tonight.”

  
His smile faltered as his eyes dropped down to the blankets that covered him. “I was kinda thinkin’ maybe that’s a bad idea.”

  
“Why?”

  
He picked at the blanket with the fingers of his good hand, pursing his lips. “It wouldn’t be the same. As before, I mean.”

  
Sitting on the edge of the bed, she took his hand in hers. “Hey,” she said, waiting until his gaze met hers. “I’m okay with that. I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t.”

  
He nodded.

  
OoO*OoO*OoO

  
When Sakura got to her office for lunch, Kakashi was waiting at the door. He waited until the door had closed behind them before he wrapped his arms around her. “I heard the surgery went well,” he said, after dropping a kiss on her lips.

  
“He ought to be going home in a few hours,” she said as she leaned her head against his chest, drinking in the scent of him.

  
“Yeah, Anko’s kind of scared about that.”

  
“Ha, she’s scared? He’s petrified. Don’t tell him I told you that.”

  
“Not a word,” Kakashi said, kissing the top of her head. “Hey, Bull wanted to know if you’re up for another puppy sleepover tonight.”

  
“Chie would love that,” Sakura said with a smile. She’d had one or another of his ninken over every night since Bisuke had first stayed over. She now had a bag of kibble in her pantry. “She’s getting so excited about the entrance ceremony and it’s still a month off.”

  
“You already got her gear?”

  
“For the most part,” Sakura said with a grin. “Ino actually came over yesterday afternoon and brought her some of Sai’s brushes. Inojin’s been training Chie, and had suggested it to his mom. Neither of us thought she’d actually do it, though. But I think Chie understands the importance of the brushes, and it seemed to really help Ino as well.”

  
“Speaking of Ino,” he said as they walked to the sofa and sat down. “Did you hear about her and Konohamaru?”

  
Sakura didn’t even try to hide the shock on her face. “I did, but the bigger question is how did you?”

  
He tapped his temple. “Ninja.”

  
“You’re turning into a regular gossip now that you’re retired. I never expected her to turn into a cougar.”

  
“If she’s a cougar, what does that make me?”

  
Sakura giggled. “A dirty old man,” she said. “Guys don’t get cute labels for cradle robbing. Sorry.”

  
“Rude.”

  
“I don’t make the rules,” Sakura said with a playful glint to her eyes as she leaned in and stole another kiss. “I love you, though.”

  
“I love you too, even if you’re insufferably mean some days.”

  
OoO*OoO*OoO

  
It was surreal for Genma, leaving the hospital. Sure, in the last week or so Sakura had loosened the restrictions on him, allowing him and Anko to go out to eat a couple times, but that was only for a few hours and then he had to be back to check his vitals.

  
Now, as he unlocked the familiar blue door, he almost couldn’t bear the  difference. Everything looked strange from the new angle in the chair and, not for the first time, he thought perhaps he ought to give crutches another try. He didn’t like the instability of them, though. With the chair he could stand when he wanted to, but also had a solid base to sit on. Years of both ambushing others and being ambushed had taught him the importance of stability.

  
“I emptied the fridge the first week,” Anko said, waving her hand towards the spartan kitchen. “I went and got groceries yesterday after work, so I can make you supper if you want.”

  
Everything else in the house looked like it had been freshly dusted. “You cleaned up too.” It was touching. Anko didn’t even make her own bed unless the sheets had been freshly laundered.

  
She chuckled. “There’s basically nothing to clean.”

  
Outside of a large fern in the corner of his living room and three photos hanging on the wall, there really wasn’t a lot of decoration. He liked things better that way. Another thing he guessed would change if she ever consented to move in, not that he would have minded.

  
“Come see,” he said, holding his arms out and inviting him onto her lap. She sat down and he wrapped his arms around her, nuzzling his face into her shoulder. “I’m glad you’re here.” _Please stay; we can make it work._

  
Her hand ran down the side of his face. “You know,” she purred, “I’ve been missing that bed of yours. And the sofa. And the table.”

  
He froze. She hadn’t seen all of him since the explosion. There were changes, things he’d been too embarrassed to talk to her about. He knew that if he’d been smart, he would have pushed her away, but just having her there had been so comfortable that he’d pushed those fears away as if that very moment would have not happened.

  
“I…” _am not really in the mood? A lie. Don’t want to disappoint you? Closer to the truth._ “I’m not sure.”

  
Running her fingers down the side of his face, over the ridges of scar tissue, she leaned her forehead against his. “You don’t want me?” Her voice was low and husky, her eyes full of a desire he wasn’t sure how she was able to muster.

  
“Fuck it,” he muttered, his hand running under her shirt. He wasn’t sure what he’d do if sense finally dawned on her, if when she saw him naked she was too repulsed to fake it any more, but he’d cross that bridge when he came to it. Rolling back to the bedroom, he let her drop kisses down his neck.

  
She climbed off of him, her deft fingers unhooking the buttons of her shirt slowly, her eyes locked on his. God, he’d missed this. She was everything he ever wanted in a woman. Beautiful. Smart. Brash.

The shirt fell away revealing a set of creamy breasts spilling over the top of a black leather bra. Her fingers toyed with the hook in her cleavage. “You sure you don’t want me?”

  
He stood, his hands covering hers, and his voice low as he watched her. “You know damn well I want you.”

  
One of her hands slid out from his, rubbing his manhood through his pants. “Then you’re entirely too dressed up for the occasion,” she said, her fingers beginning to unbutton the pants.

  
“Wait,” he said, his hand going to hers again. “I’m… not the same.”

  
She drew a deep breath, rolling her eyes as she turned and pushed him onto the bed. “I,” the bra fell away, “don’t,” she shimmied out of her skirt, her fingers looped around the thin band of her panties and slowly lowered them, “care.”

  
As she crawled onto the bed beside him, this time he let her fingers undo his pants. There was a smile on her lips, the desire not leaving her eyes as she took in the jagged scar that pulled his cock slightly to the left now, the nut he’d lost despite having worn a cup. That’s what had fucking saved him. Thank god for small favors. But she didn’t seem to mind as her lips took him in, her eyes not leaving his as she sucked.

  
“Fuck,” he hissed, his fingers running through her hair. Her mouth was always so damned good. Everything about her was always so damned good. It had been too long, though, and as she bobbed, he could already feel the energy pooling up in his core. “Fuck, babe, you’re gonna make me cum.”

  
There was a glint in her eyes that said, “That’s kind of the point.”

  
His breath caught in his throat as his body stiffened, pleasure wrapping around him like a cocoon, colors dancing before his eyes. “Fuck,” he muttered one more time as she licked up his shaft one more time, kissing the last traces of cum off the tip before she lay her head down on his chest, letting him hold her as he came down from his orgasm. “You’re so damn fucking good.”

  
“I know.” He could feel her smile.

  
“Why the hell are you so good to me?”

  
“Because you’re the only man I’ve ever loved,” she whispered , her fingers running up his shirt, dancing over the scars and memorizing the new landscape of him.

  
“Poor girl,” he chuckled, “guess love really does make people blind.”

  
“I think you’re beautiful,” she murmured as her fingers continued to run over his damaged flesh. “All of these show just how strong you are, everything you survived.”  

  
Lifting his head, he looked at her. There was no guile in her eyes. His good hand ran down her side, taking in every lush curve until he found her core. She moaned his name as he found her pearl, rubbing hard against it.

  
She hadn’t even come down from her first orgasm when she desperately breathed, “I want you inside me.”

  
He chuckled as he sat up and peeled off his clothes. “Not yet.”

  
She pouted, but a smile pulled at her lips as he crawled back, looping her leg over his shoulder. “We got all night,” he drawled. She’d made no secret of the fact that she loved the things his mouth could do to her, one of the benefits of learning how to channel chakra through his tongue. Her legs were quaking by the time he gave into her.

  
“God damn, woman,” he hissed as he buried himself deep within her. “You feel like fuckin’ heaven.”

  
He started off slow, rolling his hips, teasing her with each thrust, but when she looked at him with her clear brown eyes so full of lust and love and longing, and whispered, “Please, Genma,” he couldn’t hold himself back any more. His movements grew faster as the the tension built within him.

  
When her walls clamped tight around his cock, her legs trembling around his hips, he allowed himself to follow her, emptying himself deep within her. With a lopsided grin, he kissed her lips, chuckling as he dropped down beside her, cradling her against his chest. Her fingers laced with his as they listened to the tattoo of each other’s heartbeats, their breathing gradually slowing.

  
“I want to keep you,” she whispered so softly he almost missed it.

  
He looked down at her, smoothing the hair away from her face. “What?”

  
“I don’t want to sleep around any more,” she whispered. “I want it to just be you and me.”

  
He wrapped his arms around her even  tighter and kissed the top of her head. “I’d like that, babe. I’d like that a lot.”

  
OoO*OoO*OoO

  
The next week, she was standing on a stepladder and hanging a tapestry of a roaring lion she’d picked up at some festival in Sand a few years back. Anko’s style was decidedly… loud. Where Genma was inclined to minimalism, Anko liked bold colors and statement pieces. Somehow, their two styles meshed together. Even the oil painting of a plate of dango seemed in place.

  
Maybe in another life, he wouldn’t have been able to tolerate it. If they just had a normal relationship, perhaps. But he’d wanted to paint her on the canvas of his life since the day he met her.

  
He tried, really tried, to follow Sakura’s advice about putting his foot down now and then. Like when she wanted to paint their bedroom red. Blood red. They settled on a pale blue, and she strung fairy lights along the walls and hung an abstract painting that was positively tantric if you stared at it long enough. She wanted to hang something more provocative, but he convinced her not to as the chances of Sakura’s daughter walking into the room were high, especially as Sakura and Kakashi had helped Anko move in.

  
“You should have a housewarming party,” Sakura said carrying a stack of boxes piled so high she had to bend her knees a little to make it through the door frame.

  
“I’ve lived here for thirty years,” Genma said as he unpacked Anko’s mismatched dishes. “Do we really need all these, babe? I mean, I’ve got dishes.”

  
“Yeah, but yours are beige.”

  
“What’s wrong with beige?”

  
“It’s _beige_ ,” she said pointedly.

  
“Maybe you two could toss all of them and get something that representsed both of you a bit better,” Sakura suggested with a small grin.

  
“Shopping!” Genma and Anko both said at the same time, her with enthusiasm and him with the air of a man facing an incoming army.

  
Sakura burst out laughing. “Or you could keep some of each and try to blend them.”

  
“Well, beige does go with everything, right?” Anko said, opening his sparse cabinet with her head cocked to the side. She grabbed a purple bowl and held it against a worn beige plate so Genma could see the effect. “Like it? It adds a bit of color.”

  
“I do.” He smiled. She was definitely adding color. To every bit of his life.

  
She’d revitalized every aspect of his life. Even the mundane became vibrant with her around as she filled in a part of himself he hadn’t even known was empty.

  
He was home.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to heartbeatstumbles for beta-ing and for writing the ending to this chapter. You're amazing and this was the perfect end to this arc. 
> 
> Thanks for all the well wishes after the last chapter; they must have worked because I'm feeling great again. ^_^


	35. Chapter 35

 

 

It was a perfect afternoon. The kind that typically only come when seasons are at their freshest and the whole world sighs with relief. This particular day was the first cool day of autumn. The leaves hadn’t yet begun their transformations and the modest fall flowers were out along the roadsides.  

 

While Chie had come with them on most of their dates, this time Sarada had absolutely insisted that her little sister spend the day and night with her. That combined with Kakashi’s nervousness when he’d asked her for the date, Genma’s curiosity with it in general, and her father walking around his house absentmindedly humming the bridal march two days before had Sakura had a feeling she knew what was coming. It was a odd feeling, suspecting that your life is about to be altered, but having to pretend that things were normal. 

 

She’d bought a new dress for the occasion, new pink lace lingerie too, just in case. Her fingers kept dropping her make-up was she tried to get ready. When her doorbell rang, she bumped into her dresser and almost broke the vase that was sitting on it.  _ Okay, pull it together, Sakura!  _ her inner voice demanded.  _ You absolutely have no proof that this is anything else than a normal date! Is it so strange that two adults go out without kids in tow!  _

 

When she opened the door to find Kakashi standing there in a casual suit with flowers for her and a picnic basket, though, her heart threatened to stop. “I… you-you’re very handsome,” she sputtered. 

 

_ Okay, Hinata!  _ Inner mocked.  _ It’s Kakashi; breathe!  _

 

He scrubbed the back of his neck, a bashful grin playing on his lush lips. “You beat me to it, but you’re gorgeous,” he said. “Here, these are yours.” 

 

“Come in, I’ll just put them in water. You never did tell me where we’re going.” 

 

“It’s a surprise,” he said, a faint blush rising to his cheeks. “I think you’ll like it. Trust me?” 

 

She giggled as she put the blossoms in a vase and smiled at them before she turned back to him. “With my life.” 

 

He offered her his arm and they walked out the house into the comfortable coolness of Konoha in late September. As they walked, they chatted about how Chie’s classes were going. She’d made best friends with one of the Inuzuka girls, who recognized her from the feast, and had surprised her instructor with her level of proficiency with artistic jutsu. There was talk of fast tracking her to graduation, but she didn’t want it because that meant she and Tsukiko wouldn’t wind up on the same team. 

 

Kakashi and Sakura took the road out of the village, walking out towards the lake. He led her away from the usual picnic area, though, down a slightly overgrown footpath that wound through the woods along the edge of the water. The path ended at a clearing, and the first thing Sakura noticed was the boat tied to the dock. It was painted white with red flowers painted on the bow and stern. When she turned to Kakashi, though, she spotted the small minka with well-tended gardens all around it. 

 

“It looks like something out of a fairy tale,” she said, delighting in the lanterns that were strung out on the porch. 

 

He smiled, but said nothing as he led her up the steps. 

 

When he slid the door open, she gave another small gasp because what had seemed like a simple house was lavishly decorated. “How did you find this place?” she breathed as she slid her shoes off at the door, her gaze rooming over the jade vases and gilted table. 

 

“Atsuko told me about it,” he said as he set the basket down. Going to the irori he built a fire and set a kettle over it. 

 

_ Atsuko,  _ so she’s in on all of this too, Sakura thought, her pulse pounding in her ears. It felt like her heart would burst and part of her wished that she could just tell him that she knew and yes, obviously, yes, but he’d obviously worked so hard at it. And so she waited. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

His hands trembled as he took the kettle off the fire, and it took all his will to steady them. The ring against his chest felt like a searing brand. He’d gone back and forth about getting another box for it, consulting everyone he trusted on the matter, even going so far as to get Tenzo to make him one. It was a pretty box, but Atsuko’s reasoning finally won out the day. 

 

_ “You’ve been wearing this ring for eight months now,” Atsuko told him. “It’s been your constant reminder of her all that time. Tell her that.”  _

 

Sarada had agreed. That was much more romantic, and that was what this day was all about. Romance. The thing Kakashi had craved so much of his adult life. That unattainable dream that lay just out of reach until… 

 

Sakura smiled at him as he poured the water over the tea leaves. The sunlight through the window hit her hair in just such a way that it seemed like a rose gold halo framing her face. She was exquisite. 

 

They ate in almost complete silence. Kakashi lost in his thoughts and her eyes, whenever he could catch their teal depths. It was as if she knew. Or maybe he was just imagining that the nervous flutter in his own chest was shared. 

 

She tended towards silence as a habit. It was if she’d used up all her words in youth and now, as a woman, was contented to silently watch and wait most of the time. They had had whole conversations with faint smiles and the quirk of eyebrows. It suited him fine. He preferred it to idle chatter. Normally. In that moment, though, he wasn’t sure. Talking may have shattered the mood, but it may have also quelled some of the anxiety. 

 

“I-I…” he drew a deep breath, “was thinking perhaps we could go out on the lake after this.” The words tumbled out of his mouth faster than he’d meant them to for fear of stumbling over the syllables again. 

 

“That would be nice,” she said, a hint of rose tinting her cheeks. 

 

He wasn’t sure how he’d be able to form the words he needed to when they got to the center of the lake, but Sarada had thought that was a nice touch. He silently thanked the gods that it wasn’t raining.  _ The weather? Maybe I should comment on the _ … He resisted the urge to facepalm. 

 

“Are you okay?” It was almost her doctor tone.  _ I probably look like I’m about to have a heart attack. Can anxiety give you heart attacks? Maybe I am having a heart attack? _

 

“Fine,” he half-lied with a smile that he both felt and forced because the muscles in his face didn’t seem to want to work right.  _ Breathe. People do this every day. Sasuke managed it.  _

 

_ Damn it, Sasuke, I’m sorry. You understand, right? I want to take care of her. I just… I want her.  _ The honesty of it felt like a punch to the ribs. Every wild dream he’d had, every longing fantasy of home and hearth and love had come to mean this pink-haired woman sitting there, demurely sipping tea, her teal eyes playing hide and go seek with his darker ones. 

 

He took a sip of tea. Each heartbeat felt like a small eternity.  _ What if she says no?  _ It wasn’t the first time that thought had crossed his mind. She could. It would hurt like hell, but he would understand. 

 

He remembered that day, two months back, when he thought he’d beaten all his demons. Got too cocky for his own good. And then the call came in. Homicide. Thirteen-year-old female. Killed by her younger brother.

 

She was Rin. Even with her blonde hair and her vacant blue eyes that looked heavenward, she was Rin. It was Rin’s blood seeping into the wood floor from the gaping wounds in her chest. It didn’t matter that they were stab wounds from a kunai repeatedly struck into her. They were the hole of a chidori. 

 

The boy, because he was no more than a boy, stood, stunned and shaking. Bloodied up to his elbow. Crimson spray freckling across his face like some morbid imitation of innocence. Kakashi turned his back to the boy. 

 

It was an open and shut case. Second degree murder, probably to be downgraded later because the kid was unstable. Unstable. That’s what the whole situation had left Kakashi. 

 

He’d meant to just stop in to have a drink or two, just to settle his nerves, because he felt he could do that. He trusted himself. 

 

And he was an idiot. 

 

This time, though, the weight of the ring around his neck reminded him not to smile at the red-head across the bar or to go over and talk to that blonde leaning seductively against the pool table. He called Tenzo, who met him at The Broken Cup and walked him home.

 

They drank coffee and talked. Told each other ghost stories. That’s what they used to call them in ANBU whenever the past came back up and clawed its way out your throat. Ghost stories.

 

The next morning, he’d confessed to Sakura as if she were a priestess, able to absolve him. It was painful, both her disappointment and acceptance. She’d been waiting for it, he knew by her tone. She was always a step ahead of him that way. 

 

Maybe, he thought as he took another sip of tea, she’d remember that day and not want to commit to him. He wasn’t fixed yet. Not really. He was a collection of broken bits held together with the insecure promise of trying to be better. Pretending to be a better. Pretending to be what she wanted and needed, and worse yet, perhaps, pretending to be what  _ he _ wanted and needed.

 

Because at the end of the day he didn’t want to be a drunk that got thrown out on the street or the guy who couldn’t remember who he’d brought home the night before. He wanted to be hers. He wanted to come home to Chie and the dogs playing in the living room. He wanted birthday cakes and bedtime stories and waking up with this pink-haired goddess in his arms.    

 

Sakura set an empty tea cup down, plucking up a last stray grape from her plate she popped it in her mouth and then wiped her lips with the napkin. 

 

It was time. 

 

He stood, offering her his hand. Wordlessly she took it, rising up slowly and effortlessly as if she had wings. Graceful. That was his cherry blossom. 

 

He wanted everything to be perfect, had calculated everything down to the time they got in the boat so the sun would be setting on their shoulders as he proposed. 

 

Two weeks ago, he’d nervously asked Tenzo for a favor. Kakashi was unsure about how he would feel about using the Mokuton for something as superfluous as this, but the boat was perfect. 

 

He wordlessly guided her onto the  _ Cherry Blossom _ and pushed off into the lake. 

 

The pull of the water against the oars was a pleasant distraction. She sat, opposite him, her gaze roaming over the pristine blue of the water’s surface that matched the cloudless sky above them. Her fingers dangled over the edge of the boat, skimming the gentle waves, leaving ripples in their wake. 

 

He was almost sorry to stop, resting the oars back in place and trying to gather his wits. Perhaps a hundred times he’d run over what he was going to say just the day before, but in that moment, it was lost. 

 

It was now or never. 

 

“Sakura, I… I need to talk to you about something,” he started.  _ No, that’s not right. Too businesslike.  _

 

“Yes,” she said, a soft smile and waiting eyes. 

 

“What I meant to say is, I love you. More than I can really explain. You’ve brought me so much happiness. So much life. I can hardly imagine asking you for anything, but…” his hand went to the back of his collar and he drew the chain off from around his neck. The delicate cherry blossom ring gleamed in the sunlight. His fingers fumbled over the clasp for a minute before he was able to undo it, carefully sliding the ring off into his palm. “I meant to give you this earlier. Before, well, everything. When you broke up with me, I decided to wear it, to remind myself of what I’d lost,  _ who _ I’d lost, and why. You make me want to be a better person, and I’m not there yet, but I want to be.” He took a deep breath, and shakily got on one knee. 

 

There were tears forming in Sakura’s eyes, but the smile hadn’t left her lips and it gave him the courage to say, “Would you please do me the honor of becoming my wife?” He squeezed his eyes tight, not daring to look her in the eye just in case she—

 

“Yes! Yes! With everything I am, yes!” she said, leaning forward and kissing his lips for what could have been anywhere from a few seconds to all of eternity. He let out a breath he didn’t even know he was holding and slid the ring onto her finger. He wrapped his arms around her as tight as he could and was grateful she couldn’t see the tears forming in his eyes. 

 

Barely suppressing a sob, he whispered, “I love you.”

 

They spent the rest of the evening entangled in each other and stealing kisses while watching the sun slowly set as it lit the lake aglow. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

They were laying naked, wrapped up in each other’s arms that night, moonlight and firelight dancing over their skin. Kakashi’s soft breathing tickled against Sakura’s cheeks as she marveled at him. Her husband. Or he would be soon. 

 

Before they’d both drifted off to sleep they’d talked about the merits of a small wedding in a month or so. His birthday party notwithstanding, she knew Kakashi was not a fan of crowds or party planning. 

 

His eyes fluttered open as if he knew she was thinking of him. “Good morning,” he whispered. 

 

“It’s still night.” 

 

“Mmmm,” he tightened his grip around her waist a little. “I missed this.” 

 

Her fingers glided up his leg, teasing over his inguinal crease. “I missed this.” 

 

A soft moan escaped his lips as her fingers grazed over his cock. He dipped his head down and kissed her lips as his rough hands ran over the silken skin of her stomach, stopping just below her breast, waiting. 

 

“You’re such a tease,” she whispered against his lips. 

 

“No more than you,” he whispered back, his hand working it’s way down again over the ridges of muscle. 

 

“Hmmm,” her fingers slowly wrapped around his manhood. “Is that so?” she purred as she slowly, slowly slid her hand upward, fingertips playing around the hood of his cock before they slowly slid down again. 

 

“Yes,” he hissed, his fingers pinching her nipple. 

 

“Well, we can’t have that, can we?” she said in a seductive sing-song as she deftly climbed on top of him, her body brazen in the moonlight. 

 

“No,” he managed to say as she slid him inside of her. She didn’t even start slow. Her hands took his and pinned them up above his head and his mouth found her nipple, suckling on it as she ground against him in the primal dance. 

 

She had waited so long for this. Months of shy touches, of chaste kisses, had built up to this moment. She wanted him in the most raw way, and that was why, perhaps, when he came deep within her this time, this one time, she didn’t bother with the discreet jutsu that would kill the sperm. Instead, she sank down onto his chest and let their breathing settle into a rhythm with each other, his cock slowly going flaccid inside her, and fell asleep with the comforting feel of him inside her. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

It wasn’t until days later that she was aware of the two tiny, almost unnoticeable points of chakra in her womb. She panicked. She was thirty-eight years old. She’d just adopted a child. They were about to be married. Was it impossible for the universe to allow her to get married without being pregnant first? 

 

But she was a kunoichi. Even working in the hospital, she put her body through rigors that often led to miscarriage. Not to mention the missions she’d taken. Even if she was largely on standby as a medic, she had no disillusions about the injuries she’d accumulated over the years. Healing chakra worked wonders incomparable to normal wound healing, but stress still took its toll. How many tiny sparks of life had she and Sasuke lost over the years? She couldn’t even remember how many, usually shoving the thought down before those memories threatened to tear her breath out her lungs.  

 

And so she waited. Silver blossoms of her finger and twin flames within her. Growing slowly. If they were extinguished, she would carry that burden alone. But if they survived…

 

She smiled as she watched Kakashi and Chie walking through the marketplace. An image of  him holding hands with two tiny toddlers, one with pink hair and one with silver hair, briefly flashed through her mind. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much, heartbeatstumbles! She's both beta-ing and co-writing, and ladies and gents this woman is brilliant. I just can't say it enough.


	36. Chapter 36

It had been three weeks since Sakura had first discovered the twins. She wondered, offhandedly as she was in the middle of her morning rounds, how much longer it would be until she would have to tell Kakashi. Sasuke had sensed the presence of Sarada's chakra early in her second month. There were several others they lost in the first weeks, and when he found out it had crushed him almost more than it had her. She could still see his haunted eyes in the nights that followed the miscarriages. 

 

Though she had done all the right things and taken the correct precautions, it still took them many tries before they had Sarada. Even then, the pregnancy was wrought with complications-- though Sarada was eventually born healthy. 

 

She couldn't bear to see that disappointment in Kakashi's eyes, not with these being his first children. He'd already lost so many people. She hoped that they would sneak past his detection, at least for the time being. However, she knew he was an incredibly skilled tracker who would have no trouble picking up the scent if he was looking for it. 

 

She’d long ago given up praying, but she would have been lying to herself not to admit that something very near a prayer crossed her lips as she wished these children long and happy lives. 

 

Morning rotations were almost over when she stopped in of the room of their latest permanent resident. A ten year old boy, Haruto, who had been brought in after murdering his sister. 

 

Haruto’s parents had not come to see him once, abandoning him in the hands of the village. Sakura watched him through the glass and wondered if she could bring herself to do any better. They’d lost both of their children that day. 

 

Her hand inadvertently when to her stomach. She turned to the nurse’s desk. “I need two of you in here with me,” she said, nodding to a couple of medics who were doing reports. While Haruto had not shown any violent outbursts since he’d been institutionalized, he was still a security threat. 

 

She thought back to one baby she’d lost after a patient threw her into a wall. That had been when Sarada was five. She’d only been about four weeks into the pregnancy, but she’d cried herself to sleep every night for a month alone in their double bed. 

 

“Good morning, Haruto-kun,” she said cheerfully as she walked in behind the other medics. “How are you feeling this morning?” 

 

“Fine,” he said, his eyes not leaving the window. 

 

“Did you sleep well?”

 

“Yes.” 

 

“Do you think we can talk today? About what happened?” 

 

“No.” There was no spark of emotion in his face as he said it, no sign that any of it registered with him at all. 

 

“I talked to Iruka-sensei about you the other day. He said you were planning to take the chunin exams this year. That was a big decision. Why did you want to do that?” 

 

He shrugged. 

 

She bit back a sigh. “I’ll be back this afternoon,” she said as she turned to walk away. 

 

“They’re going to die,” he said. 

 

“Who’s going to die?” 

 

“Your sons,” he said, turning to her and looking her in the eye for the first time. “They’re going to die.” 

 

Though his words chilled her to the bone, she forced her face to remain neutral. “I don’t know what you're talking about, Haruto-kun.” 

 

He glanced at her abdomen for a moment before reflecting his cold gaze against hers and raised his eyebrows in contempt.  

 

“Okay, medic-san.”

 

She held her gaze for a few seconds until it became clear that he was not going to say anything else and walked out the room without another word to him. Her voice was shaky as she told the medics, “Thank you for your help. I’ll be back around four.” She waited until she was safely back in her office before she let the tears fall. 

 

_ No one can see the future. He’s just an angry little boy lashing out at whatever he thinks will rattle me. What would some random kid know?  _ It was an old curse to hurl at people, the wish that one’s sons die. As a child, she’d always wondered why no one ever bothered to wish a person’s daughters die, but as she grew she understood. Clan names here passed down patrilineally. 

 

Her hand went to her abdomen. Were they sons? Twin Hatake boys. She’d never put much stock in the old chauvinistic traditions, but she had to admit, she’d always wondered what it would be like to have a little boy. 

 

She pushed the thought out her mind. It was a dangerous thing, thinking too much about unborn children. Especially in her line of work. All it would take would be one complex surgery, one surprise attack from a patient, for her to lose them. Twins carried a higher rate of complications as well. They were like snowflakes. Beautiful, unique, and impossibly fragile. 

 

There was a knock on the door. “Come in,” she said, wiping away the tears. 

 

“What happened?” Kakashi asked before he’d even fully opened the door. Of course, he’d smelled her tears. She's forgotten that she'd asked him to go to lunch with her.

 

She shook her head. “Sometimes patients just know what buttons to press sometimes,” she offered weakly, and then sighed. “Are you ready to go?”

 

“You sure that’s all?” His question hung heavy as he wrapped his arms around her. She could hear own advice to so many other couples. Be open. Be honest. Communication is key to a successful relationship. 

 

Three and a half weeks pregnant. Their hearts were beating. Their chakra was stronger than she’d remembered of the others, but it had been years and none of them had been twins. 

 

She didn't want to think about what would happen if Kakashi sensed them before she told him. 

 

Sakura closed her eyes, leaning her head against his chest because she knew if she looked into the slate gray depths of his eyes she wouldn’t be able to find the words. “I’m pregnant.” It was barely a whisper. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

Kakashi couldn’t believe what he’d just heard. It sounded like Sakura had said she was pregnant. His mind ran over all the things she could have said besides that. What words sound like pregnant?  _ I’m great? _ Yes, but that didn’t quite match the mood.  _ I’m a pedant?  _ At times. Did she jus--

 

“What?” He didn’t breathe for fear of missing it again. 

 

“I’m pregnant.” 

 

If the floor beneath them had given way he wouldn’t have been more surprised. He breathed again, but it was hitching and uneven. “Are you… are you sure?” 

 

“I’m a doctor, Kakashi.” 

 

“I just…” He held her at arm’s length for a moment, his hand going to her abdomen. “I’m going to be a dad?” he mumbled under his breath. “I'm going to be a  _ dad?! _ ”  His words were soft, reverent. When he looked back at her there were tears forming in his eyes, but a smile on his lips. “I’m gonna be a dad!” He picked her up and twirled her around. 

 

Panic flooded him and he set her down quickly, his hand going back to her belly. “I’m sorry. Are you okay? Is she okay?” 

 

“She? How do you know it’s a girl?” 

 

“I don't. Do you? I’ve gotten kind of used to girls.” 

 

“It’s too early to tell,” she said. 

 

There was a sadness in her eyes that he didn’t understand. Did she not want a child? True, they weren’t married yet, but that wasn’t so unusual in the village, and they were engaged. It's not like they cared about what the rest of the village thought in the first place. So then....

 

“What’s wrong?” 

 

She drew another deep breath. “There’s a very real possibility that I’ll miscarry. I’ve lost a lot of children, Kakashi.” 

 

It felt as if all the oxygen had been sucked from the room. “This time will be different.” 

 

She shook her head. “This job is hard.” 

 

“Then take a break,” he said quickly. “Take… maternity leave.”  _ Was that how it worked? _ His head spun as he slowly realized just how much he didn't know.

 

She gave him a flat look. “Maternity leave is for after you have a child, not for when you’re pregnant.” 

 

“Oh.” He tried for a sheepish grin. But what if….

 

“Do you… not want this baby?” Kakashi faltered.  _ Please, please say you want her. I'll do anything. Be anything.  _

 

“I want this baby. These babies,” she amended with a sheepish smile. “It's…”

 

“Babies?” His head spun. A boy and a girl, he could see them perfectly in his mind. Chubby little hands and big eyes. He could picture rocking them in the moonlight and teaching them to walk and pushing them on the swings at the park. 

 

“Babies,” she said,  the sadness not quite leaving her eyes. 

 

His heart fell a little. “How many children have you miscarried?”

 

“Kakashi, I honestly don't remember.” There was a brokenness in her voice that he partially understood.  It was the sound of him explaining Rin's death. But even that seemed to pale in comparison. This was… more jarring. 

 

He pulled her back into his arms. “This time will be different,” he promised her. He would do everything in his power to ensure that this time would be different. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

“You want me to fire Sakura?” Naruto asked slowly. 

 

“No, no, not fire her, give her an extended leave of absence. A sabbatical if you will,” Kakashi offered with an eye crinkling smile. 

 

“I can't just tell the hospital board one of their directors needs a year long vacation without an excuse, ya know?”

 

“We getting married,” Kakashi offered. 

 

“Next month,” Naruto said pointedly. Then he sighed, scratching the back of his head the way he would as a kid. “Tell you what. I'll try to talk then into giving her three months off. How about that? One to prepare, and two for a honeymoon.” He winked at his sensei. 

 

It wasn't what Kakashi had hoped for, but maybe it was enough to protect his children. “That would be great!” 

 

“Just wondering,” Naruto called as Kakashi turned to leave,  “Why didn't Sakura come ask me?”

 

“You know Sakura, she's always trying to prove she's strong enough to handle things alone.” And she had,  for decades. Quite capably for the most part, but Kakashi's promise wasn't empty. He wanted to be there for every step of the way. Things would be different. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

He stood in front of the door of an empty bedroom. It had been used exactly once, and then as a storage room for Anko while she was moving in with Genma. Now it was empty of everything. 

 

Except in his imagination he pictured two cribs and a set of rocking chairs and giant stuffed animals. He could hear Sakura singing lullabies. And suddenly the giant house didn't seem like such a bad idea anymore. They would have three kids at home and one on her own. 

 

The front door opened. “Kakashi?!” Sakura's voice called. 

 

“Down the hall.”

 

She looked a little miffed when she got there. “Three months leave?” she asked with her hand on her hip. 

 

“For the babies. I didn't tell anyone.”

 

Her expression softened slightly. “And what if there's an emergency?”

 

“Shizune's a skilled surgeon. The village will survive three months.”

 

She chuckled as she wrapped her arms around his waist. “The bigger question is: Will you survive having a hormonal pregnant wife trapped at home?”

 

He smiled down at her, pecking her lips before he said,  “No one's trapping you. You've got full run of the village, no,  the world. I just want you to be safe, to take it easy and relax. And see a doctor.” He added the second part with a playful sternness. Doctors make lousy patients. 

 

“So what were you doing back here?”

 

He grinned as he left her go, stepping backward into the room. “What do you think? The cribs right here and here? And then rockers by the window? Maybe paint the room a pale green with leaves on it? Or pink, with cherry blossoms?”

 

“What if one of them is a boy?”

 

“Good thinking! Green is better. And…  and curtains, we'll need good curtains. And a big shelf full of books, because we're going to read to them every night!”

 

She pressed her fingers to her lips,  smiling prettily as she rocked on her heels. 

 

“What?” he asked. 

 

She shook her head with a small chuckle. “Nothing,  you're just cute when you're excited.”

 

“I wish you were excited.” He winced slightly at the sound of it. His tone had been soft, caring, but he knew the words were harsh. 

 

“I'll be excited when I hold them.”

 

_ You're already holding them,  _ he wanted to say,  but he respected her fears. It hurt to get close to people you were sure you were going to lose. He had spent the first three decades of his life trying to hold people at arm’s distance to avoid being hurt. He knew that feeling, even if he didn't share her fears. 

 

These children would survive. They would grow surrounded by love and family and happiness. He believed that with every fiber of his being. 

 

They would be a family.


	37. Chapter 37

Ino leaned across the small table and slid a book to Sakura, pointing at a picture of a flower covered archway. “You’ve got to at least get this,” she said. 

 

“We said we wanted it simple,” Sakura reminded her as she looked down at the beautiful arch, feeling her determination crumbling. 

 

“Your first wedding happened with no one but Karin and a priest there. Not only do you owe it to yourself to have a proper wedding, but this is Kakashi’s  _ first _ marriage. And hopefully the last. You’ve got to at least  _ try _ to make it special,” Ino whined. 

 

“It will be special.” Of that, Sakura had no doubts. “And this is lovely..” 

 

“I knew you’d love it!” Ino said with a triumphant glint in her eyes. “So, we’re getting this, what about the flowers for the centerpieces. You said there will be about 40 people there, but knowing Konoha, let’s go with a solid 100. You don't always see the most prodigious medic of her generation marry the most infamous hokage.” 

 

Sakura’s smile fell as her eyes opened a bit wider. 

 

“Oh, don’t pretend that thought didn’t cross your mind. The Rokudaime gets married to the hospital director and you think it’ll stay quiet? The Inuzuka clan alone would double  _ my _ estimate.”

 

“I doubt they’ll all come…” 

 

“Pffft.” Ino waved her hand. “This is why you ought to just let me do all the wedding planning.” 

 

“But I like party planning,” Sakura said with a slight pout. 

 

“When it’s not your party, you do.” Ino took the book back and flipped through it until she came to the section for centerpieces. “So, maybe these two here. What do you think?” 

 

“They’re very nice.” Sakura’s stomach churned and she leaned her forehead against her hand. They looked identical, but her head was starting to hurt. 

 

“I think we should do fairy lights and lanterns in the trees, too. That would be really pretty especially as you guys are doing it at sunset.” 

 

“That would be nice.”

 

Ino tilted her head to the side. “Are you okay? You look kind of green.” 

 

With that, Sakura got up and walked quickly to the bathroom, barely making it to the toilet before her breakfast all came back up. When she was sure it was safe to stand again, she rinsed her mouth out, gripping the marble countertop as she stared at herself in the mirror. 

 

There was a knock on the door and a second later, Ino walked in, opening the closet and grabbing a new toothbrush from off the shelf. “Here,” she sighed, handing it to her friend. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me. I’m supposed to be your best friend.” 

 

“Tell you what?” Sakura asked, hoping Ino just meant that Sakura wasn’t feeling well. 

 

“What? Sakura Haruno, Resurrector of Clans. Kind of has a ring to it,” Ino said flatly. “So when are you due?” 

 

“May,” she said as she spread toothpaste onto the brush.

 

Ino squealed. “Oh my god! I’m so happy for you!” she wrapped her arms around Sakura’s waist as she was brushing her teeth. “I’m gonna spoil this kid soooo much!” 

 

Sakura spit, rinsed out her mouth again and said, “You are an evil woman. You know that?” 

 

“Don’t sound so surprised. I moonlight in interrogations.” Ino winked at their reflections as she leaned her head on Sakura’s shoulder. “Torturing people is what I do. Is that why you’re taking off from the hospital?” 

 

“Kakashi thinks that may actually help me carry to term.” It was hard to keep the doubt and bitterness out of her voice. 

 

Ino’s eyes softened and she nuzzled her nose into Sakura’s shoulder, tightening her arms slightly. “You will. Between Kakashi and I, we will be there 24/7. Just wait and see. Oh my god, Forehead, you’re going to have the prettiest little baby in the history of pretty babies and I gave birth to Inojin. That’s a high bar.” 

 

Sakura leaned her head against her friend’s, her hand rested on top of Ino’s. “Thanks.” 

 

Ino let her go and went to the door. “I’m gonna make you some ginger tea. It always helped me with morning sickness.” 

 

“Thanks,” Sakura said again as she followed Ino to the kitchen. “I’d forgotten how miserable these first few months were.” 

 

“Think you’ll be okay for the wedding?” Ino filled the kettle and set it on the stovetop. 

 

“That’s why we planned it for the evening.” 

 

“Smart thinking. Is Chie excited?” 

 

“She doesn’t know yet. No one does. You know, I’ve lost so many. It doesn’t feel fair to let anyone get their hopes up, and after Sasuke I really don’t think I can stand any more condolences for the next few decades.” 

 

Ino nodded. “I’ll keep it hush hush then. Though, permission to bug Kakashi about names?” 

 

“Permission granted.” Sakura smiled and leaned against the breakfast bar. “How are things going with Konohamaru?” 

 

A faint blush rose to Ino’s cheeks. “He’s just…” she sighed. “He’s perfect. Which is weird.” She laughed. “I mean, I still remember when he was this annoying, little brat, but then it was like all of a sudden he was- him. Does that make sense?” 

 

“Yeah, it kind of does.” Sakura couldn’t help but smiling. “Maybe you and Kakashi should sit down and commiserate the weirdness of both of your situations, because I’m pretty sure he would have never in his wildest dreams imagined that love-sick, crying, little girl he got saddled with teaching would grow up to be his wife.” 

 

“Don’t tell anyone, but I’m thinking of getting Konohamaru to move in with me.” 

 

Sakura’s eyebrows shot up. “Isn’t that a bit soon?” 

 

Ino shrugged. “Life’s short.” 

 

“That’s true.” 

 

Ino pulled a couple of cups down and filled the tea bags with ginger root from a glass jar. Pouring the boiling water in she said, “I started boxing the things in Sai’s studio.” 

 

“That’s good.” 

 

Ino turned to face her and leaned her elbows on the cabinet. “I think he’d want me to move on. To be happy.” 

 

“I think so too.” 

 

Ino nodded, a sad smile on her lips, but her eyes were clear and bright. Sai would have wanted that for her. He would have wanted her to smile, to love, to live. Although Sakura couldn’t imagine many people more different to Ino’s graceful late husband than Konohamaru Sarutobi, she had to admit, they were sweet together. 

 

“Maybe in a year or so, I’ll let you plan our wedding,” Ino said with a faraway look in her eyes before she turned to Sakura and teased, “if of course, you hand me over the reins to yours.” 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

“So, this will be my room?” Chie asked as she walked into the bright bedroom with the large windowed reading nook.  

 

“Do you like it?” Kakashi asked, watching her somewhat nervously, as he and Sakura stood in the doorway. She was a secretive little girl, slow to speak and rarely showing emotion. He wasn’t 100% sure where he stood with her. 

 

“It’s very big,” she said, measuring each word as she walked around the room, her eyes taking in the furniture they’d moved into it. “I like it, though. Can the pack sleep in here with me?” 

 

Sakura chuckled. “I think they’d like that.” 

 

Chie pursed her lips. 

 

“What’s wrong, honey?” Kakashi asked. 

 

“Are you sure you want me here?” Her gaze was on her feet. “I have nightmares.” 

 

Kakashi walked up to her and crouched down, taking both her hands in his. “We’ve all got nightmares. But, I definitely want you here. We’re all going to be a family, you, your mom, Sarada, and me.” 

 

Chie gave him a small smile. “Can I call you Dad?” 

 

“I’d like that very much,” Kakashi said. 

 

She nodded. Her eyes darted to the boxes that were stacked in the corner of the room. “Should I unpack now, or when we move in for real?” 

 

“Whatever you’d like, sweetheart.” 

 

She nodded again, walking towards the boxes. 

 

Kakashi stood up and went to Sakura, who had her fingers pressed to her lips. “What do you think?” he whispered as they watched her carefully taking out her books and going to the shelves under the benches in the reading nook. 

 

“I think we have a beautiful family,” she said, happy tears pooling up in her teal eyes. Her hands inadvertently went to her womb. Ten weeks. Each day they grew a little stronger. She could sense the power of their chakra growing each day. Sarada had been that way, and she took it as a good sign. 

 

Kakashi walked behind her, wrapping his arms around her, cradling her hands in his. “Yes, we do,” he said softly. 

 

“Dad?” Chie asked. 

 

It sparked a jolt of pride in Kakashi. “Yes, dear?” 

 

“Do you think I could bring Bisuke to school with me?  Tsukiko is able to to bring her ninken.” 

 

“Well, that’s because hers are  _ hers _ ,” Sakura said gently. 

 

Kakashi, though, said, “Why don’t we ask your sensei. It wouldn’t make much sense for you to train with dog you couldn’t bring out with you in the field. Remember they’re summons. They’re not like your friend Tsukiko’s ninken.” 

 

Chie sighed. “It’s okay. I understand.” She turned back to the boxes. 

 

“Maybe,” Kakashi said, “you could sign the scroll, though.” 

 

Chie’s head whipped around, her eyes going wide. “Do you mean it?” 

 

“Do you want to?” 

 

She nodded, her breath quickening. 

 

“Now, I can’t promise which ones will work with you. That’s up to them. I’m not sure if they’ll answer to someone outside of the Inuzuka bloodline. And no matter what, it takes quite a bit of training to be able to use the summons. You’d have to work hard.” 

 

“I can do that!” she said, clasping her hands together. For a moment she looked like she didn’t know what to do, but then she ran and launched herself onto Kakashi, clinging to him with all four limbs. “Thank you!” she said into his chest. 

 

“Of course, my daughter.”

 

“You keep working in here. I need to go have a talk with Pakkun,” he said, ruffling her hair. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

“I don’t know, Boss,” Pakkun said. “I’m all for it, but you know, it’s not up to me. The Dog Sage has to give his consent.” 

 

“I know,” Kakashi said. 

 

“She’s a sweet kid,” Pakkun said, gesturing his nose towards her room. “Likes Bisuke a bit too much for my taste, but…” He lifted a paw as if to say, “What can I do about it?” 

 

“You’ll come back with the new scroll, then?” 

 

“I’ll try.” 

 

That was all Kakashi could ask for. There were generations of Inuzuka names on that scroll, others were few and far between, his and his father’s being one of the rare exceptions. All they could do was try though. Chie would need the kind of protection they offered when she went out on the field, and they were already loyal to her. His pack was already in love with her.  Hatake blood or not, she was his.

 

Hopefully the Dog Sage could see that too. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

Kakashi had set out early that morning to buy some flowers for Obito, Rin, and Sensei. It was a bittersweet feeling, knowing that his team would approve of him and Sakura wholeheartedly but would never get to see it. 

 

“Hi,  welcome to Yamanaka Flow--”

 

Ino stopped dead in her tracks when she saw who it was. 

 

Kakashi suddenly felt the need to find a different flower shop, but it was too late. Ino swooped in. 

 

“What can I get for you today, Mr. Haruno?” she asked, with a wry grin. “Flowers on the house for the expecting father.”

 

“Did she tell you?”

 

“No, I figured it out. I specialize in the mind, but I do know basic triage. Really, I’m surprised no one else has noticed yet. We live in a village of shinobi.”

 

Kakashi didn’t know what to say to that. 

 

“So, have you figured out any potential names yet?” Without waiting for his response, she continued. “Good, me too. I was thinking….Ino if it’s a girl, and….hmmm. Maybe Naruto if it’s a boy?”

 

“No. I haven’t thought of names for them yet, and even if I did, why wouldI name our children after you and a fishcake?” He sputtered, caught completely off guard at this bizarre turn of events. He was just looking to buy some flowers….

 

Ino’s eyes widened. “Them?”

 

“.....”

 

“Oh my god, congratulations!! I am going to kill your wife because she did NOT mention that she was having twins.Twins, Kakashi! Just think of the names you could give the two! Oh my god, what if you named them….”

 

“No.”

 

“I haven’t even said anything yet,” Ino pouted. 

 

“Please don’t. My children will not be named like a set menu.” He turned to leave, rubbing his temples. His team could do without the flowers. 

 

“Oh I know, what abou—?”

 

The door closed before she could finish. 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

“Kakashi, you’re home! We got take-out from Ichiraku’s, come enjoy it while it’s hot!” Sakura grinned at Chie. “Chie’s favorite toppings are the narutomaki. We’ll have to tell Naruto the next time we see him!”

 

Kakashi could already feel the headache he would get after Ino heard about this. 

  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To anyone who read the first draft of this, I apologize so much! Heartbeatstumbles added some really great stuff, so I deleted the first one, not realizing it would delete the comments too. I'm so sorry, ladies. (I'm probably the least tech-saavy person you know.) Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it! What do you think their names ought to be?


	38. Chapter 38

Two days before the wedding, Sakura got a phone call from the hospital in the middle of the afternoon. “Director Uchiha,” she said as she stepped back from the picture she’d just hung in Chie’s room. 

 

“It’s Shizune, look, we’ve got everything under control for now, but there’s something I think you should know about one of the patients, Haruto Miyano.” 

 

Sakura’s breath caught. As much as she’d tried to, she couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling she’d had ever since he’d let on that he knew she was pregnant and that her sons would die. “Yes,” she managed to say.

 

“He has the sharingan.” 

 

The phone clattered the the ground and Sakura grabbed it. “I’m sorry,” she said, “I think I misheard you.” 

 

“No, you didn’t. He’s got the kekkei genkai of the Uchiha clan. We’ve tried to get in contact with his parents, but so far we haven’t been able to find them.” 

 

Sakura’s mind raced. Surely there had to be Uchihas that escaped the massacre, maybe one of parents was an illegitimate child who didn’t know their heritage. “It’s not unheard of, recessive traits...” 

 

“You and I both know the sharingan is not a recessive trait,” Shizune said. “Right now we have him on chakra blockers, but I thought you should know.” 

 

Her mind went to Sasuke and Itachi, to the long, bloody history of their clan. “Keep him on them,” she said. “And as soon as you’re able to get blood samples from his parents. Maybe retest the autopsy samples from his sister.” 

 

“Already on it,” Shizune said. “Look, I just thought you should hear it from me, rather than through gossip. You know how people talk.” 

 

“Thank you.”

 

It wouldn’t have been the first time people talked about her unorthodox first marriage. Gossips had been particularly cruel with innuendos of Sasuke having multiple families in neighboring villages, but Sakura had never put any stock in it. Sasuke had been a single-minded type person, not prone to self-indulgence. He may have been guilty of many things, but, she thought as she set the phone back on the table and went back to unpacking, but cheating was not one of them. No there had to be some other explanation for why Haruto had the sharingan. 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi was wrapping things up at the office when his door burst open. Genma came in, slight limp from the newly reattached leg, but smirking as he wrapped his arm around Kakashi’s shoulders. Behind him were Raido and Tenzo. “What’s going on?” Kakashi asked as Genma led him to the door. 

 

“We’re kidnapping you,” Genma said as they walked through the office towards the front door. 

 

“To do what?” He had a sinking feeling that he knew. 

 

“Knit, dumbass,” Genma said as he pushed the door open to the darkened street. 

 

“Sakura’s expecting me back home.” 

 

“No, she’s not,” Tenzo said with a sheepish smile. “I told her we’d be taking you to supper.” 

 

“And by supper, he means to feast your eyes on the sexiest women in all of Konoha. Paradise Room,” Genma added with a devilish grin. “You’re gonna have the bachelor party of the fuckin’ century.” 

 

Kakashi maneuvered out of Genma’s grip only to be caught on the shoulder by Raido, who chuckled, “Don’t make this any harder than you have to.”

 

“Guys, isn’t this a bad idea?” Kakashi’s face burned. “I’ve been sober for almost a year and I don’t really want to watch anyone else but Sakura take her clothes off…” 

 

At that all the guys burst out laughing. He looked around them confused for a minute before Tenzo finally cracked. Blushing a little, he said “Relax, Senpai. We’re just messing with you; Genma wanted to see your face after he suggested strippers. We’re just going out to dinner.” 

 

Kakashi drew a relieved breath. 

 

“You’re no fuckin’ fun,” Genma muttered under his breath, glaring at Tenzo. 

 

“You’ve got the maturity of a twelve-year-old,” Raido countered for the younger man,  but there was as smirk playing at the corner of his mouth as he looked at his friend. 

 

They went out to eat barbeque and sat for hours talking about the old days. Raido and Gemma took turns giving Kakashi marriage advice. He promptly disregarded Genma's. Taking marriage advice from unmarried men, he thought, was a bit like taking tactical advice from a chef. He and Sakura would figure it out. He hoped. 

 

Tenzo was silent, stirring his drink, he appeared to be lost in thought. “You don’t have anything to add?” Kakashi asked, tilting his head towards his friend. 

 

“Huh?” Tenzo looked up, slightly startled. “Oh, um… don’t forget your anniversary.” 

 

Of all the advice he’d heard in the last two hours, that oddly seemed the most sound. “What’s with you?” 

 

Genma snorted. “He’s dreaming about that girl that started working at TenTen’s shop; you know, the one he’s never going to fuckin’ work up the courage to ask out.” 

 

Tenzo’s glare was cutting, but his blush said otherwise. 

 

“Why don’t you invite her to the wedding?” Kakashi said as he leaned back. 

 

“Because he’s still licking his damn wounds from- what was her name?” 

 

“Mei,” Tenzo muttered.

 

“Mei that works at the hospital?” Kakashi asked, an amused smirk on his face. 

 

“Yeah.” 

 

“She turned me down flat when I was younger.” 

 

Raido’s brow furrowed. “You know, I think she turned me down too.” 

 

Genma raised his hands. “Don’t look at me; I never even tried. Not my type. But look at it this way,” he leaned towards Tenzo, “these two assholes struck out, but you at least got a couple dates.” 

 

Tenzo didn’t look any less miserable. 

 

“How did I not hear about this?” Kakashi asked. 

 

“You’ve been kind of busy,” Tenzo said. 

 

“My point,” Genma said, “is that it’s been three months. You need to get back out there. Take shop girl to Kakashi’s wedding.” 

 

“Kamin.” 

 

“Excuse me?” 

 

“Her name,” Tenzo said. “It’s Kamin.” 

 

“Cute,” Genma said, then took a sip of his drink. “Ask her out.” 

 

“I don’t really have time for a relationship.” 

 

“Bullshit.” 

 

“I agree with Genma,” Kakashi said. “I’ll ask her for you if you don’t.” 

 

Tenzo looked horrified. 

 

“Don’t make me do it; you know I will. She can be your plus one at the wedding!” 

 

OoO*OoO*OoO

 

Sakura was sitting up in the living room when Kakashi came in. “Had fun?” she asked with a smile after she kissed him. 

 

“Surprisingly, yeah,” he said with a chuckle as he wrapped his arms around her waist and swayed gently as if they were dancing. “I kind of panicked at first, I thought Genma was going to drag me to a strip club.” 

 

Snorting, Sakura shook her head. “He would have, but everyone vetoed it.” 

 

“He’s never going to grow up is he?” 

 

“Probably not,” Sakura said. “But he means as well as the rest of them. Besides, it works with Anko. She would probably love the idea of dragging you to a strip club.” 

 

“I wouldn’t put it past her to suggest it to Genma in the first place,” he said, his arm draped around her as he led them to their bedroom. “How are the babies?” 

 

“Fine,” she said, her hand going to her belly. Chuckling, she added, “Playful.” 

 

“Really?” His steps stopped and he put his hands beside hers. He knelt before her, his face going to her womb and he whispered, “Hey, are you two giving your mama problems already?” 

 

He focused and felt both of their chakra, could sense their heartbeats, wild and strong. His eyes stung with tears. These were his children. His. He kissed her belly. 

 

“Can you sense them?” Sakura asked, her fingers running through his hair. 

 

He nodded. “Yeah. I just-” he sighed. “I’m so in love with them already.” 

 

He heard the sharp intake of air and the bite of her lip to stop it. She was still worried, but he wasn’t. “There was a kid at the hospital, the one who killed his sister,” she said. 

 

“I remember him.” 

 

“He said they were going to die.” 

 

Kakashi stood up, taking Sakura’s hands in his he searched her eyes. Of all the people he knew, Sakura was among the least superstitious. She’d become a woman of science, one who valued hard facts above emotion. 

 

“He’s just a crazy kid,” Kakashi said. 

 

“He has the sharingan.” 

 

His brows knit together. “Are you sure?” 

 

She rolled her eyes. “I didn’t see it myself, but I’m assuming Shizune is a competent enough medic and ninja to recognize a sharingan when she sees one.” 

 

“But if it wasn’t activated when he was with you there’s no guarantee that he enough knew you were pregnant, much less was able to see the future. Also, the sharingan  _ can’t see _ the future. That falls in the territory of tea leaves and Ouija.” 

 

“He sounded like he knew.” 

 

This was getting ridiculous. “Look at me,” Kakashi said firmly. When her teal eyes met his he said, “When I was his age I knew how to make calculated statements to cut into whoever I was talking to. Let’s say he’s just really good at chakra detection. He knows you’re pregnant for twins. He goes for the one thing he knows would scare a mother. It’s not that complicated a thing to do.” 

 

“You weren’t there.” 

 

“No, but I was there after he killed his sister. You know what I saw? A scared, disturbed, little boy. That’s it. So what if he’s got the sharingan? I’m part of the Inuzuka clan, but I wasn’t raised in it. How difficult is it to imagine one of his parents, or both of them, were illegitimate children of the Uchiha clan? There were an awful lot of them back in the day.” 

 

She nodded. 

 

“He doesn’t know the future,” Kakashi said as he cradled her head against his chest. 

 

“I know,” she said, but he heard doubt in her voice. 

 

“You know what I think?”

 

“What?” 

 

“I think one of them is going to be Hokage and the other one will be the next legendary medic.” 

 

“What if they want to be an artist and a musician?” she asked with a playful glint back in her eyes. 

 

He chuckled. “Well, every family needs a few black sheep, right?” 

 

“Your daddy doesn’t mean that,” she said tilting her head down to the twins. 

 

“We’ll love them,” Kakashi said. He kissed her lips as he wrapped his arms tight around her again. “No matter what, we’ll love them.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm posting this week's chapter early because tomorrow looks like it will be chock full of busy-ness. I hope you guys enjoy it!


	39. Chapter 39

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who’s back, nerds!!! -Heartbeatstumbles
> 
> OoO*OoO*OoO
> 
> Hey, guys and gals, (are there any guys here? now I'm curious) anyway... Hey! I'm back! Thanks to all of you who've stuck around, and I'm very sorry for the delay. The story's wrapping up. We've got about four more chapters to go. Thanks again for following and commenting! I hope you enjoy. ^_^ -LeafFic

Sakura woke to a crash of thunder followed by a scream. "Chie!" she called as she scrambled out of bed, followed by Kakashi. They found the little girl shivering under the covers with her knees tucked under her chin and Sasuke's cloak clutched in her white-knuckled hands. "It's just a storm," Sakura said as she sat down beside Chie, smoothing down her hair. 

Chie's lips moved, but nothing came out. Drawing a deep breath through her nose, she bit her bottom lip before she tried again. "I don't like storms." 

"I know," Sakura said softly. "But you know we're safe in here, right? Dad and I are just across the hall, and this is a strong house." 

Chie nodded. "Will it ruin your wedding?" 

Sakura was about to say something, but Kakashi beat her to it. " _Nothing_ is going to ruin our wedding," he said. 

They stayed with her until she fell asleep again, and Kakashi carefully tucked another blanket around her before they left, quietly closing the door behind them. Inside their room, Sakura went up to the large window and looked out at the wind-whipped sheets of rain. "She’s right. There's no way we'll be able to hold the wedding in the yard tomorrow," she said as Kakashi put his hands on her shoulders. 

"Then we'll do it in the house." 

"Everyone won't fit in the house," she said, worry heavy in her voice. 

"I thought you said everyone in Kohona would fit in here," he teased. 

She turned to him, searching his face for some concern, but there wasn't any. "This is your first wedding," she reminded him. 

At that, he laughed, guiding her back to the bed. "You make it sound like I'll have more than one," he said before he leaned in and trailed kisses down her neck using them as punctuation as he said, "I wouldn't care... if war broke out tomorrow... you and me... we're getting married. Even if no one else is there and I have to henge into Naruto to do it. Not having second thoughts, are you?" 

"Never." It had been a long hard road getting to where they were, she thought as she let her hands explore his body as her lips crashed against his hungrily. 

She relished the feeling of his muscles over hers until he froze again, as he did so often lately. "Are you sure? Even with the...." 

 _Oh my god, is this why we haven’t had sex in a while?_ Resisting the urge to roll her eyes, she said, "I'm a doctor; the one thing I know is the human body. Jutsu would threaten them, but sex? No, sex is safe. That’s not how it works." There was still doubt in his eyes, so she brought her hand up to the side of his face and forced him to look into her eyes. "I wouldn't do anything to threaten them. You know that, don't you?" She smirked, adding, “Also, no matter how big you are, you still wouldn’t be able to reach them no matter how hard you tried.

"If you say so," he said softly, tipping his head down and kissing her lips. Although she felt she was better than most at reading people, Kakashi had spent all his life hiding his inner feelings. He was perhaps more apt at that than anything else and considering he was a genius, that said something. 

Her thoughts were cut short as his fingers found her clit, rubbing against the sensitive nub. A low moan escaped her lips, and she felt him smile. "You know, I'm pretty sure we're supposed to wait until after the wedding for this," he said, teasing his hand down her thigh. 

"I'm pretty sure we're about two months too late to worry about what people will say about us," she said, her fingers wrapping around his hard cock. 

His eyes began to cloud with lust, but he joked back, "Two months? I'm pretty sure we've had people talking longer than that." 

"I should have known," she said, resisting a gasp as his deft fingers went back to her clit, moving more rapidly than before.

"What's that?" he purred into her ear. 

"You... liked when people were talking about us," she managed to get out before her back arched. 

He chuckled but didn't stop his ministrations. “I did.” Although she admittedly was less experienced than he was, she was still amazed that he was able to bring her to the brink as quickly as he was. As soon as she trusted her legs again, she flipped him onto his back, her eyes predatory as she easily climbed on top him. God, it felt so _good_  when he filled her up. Even though they'd made love many times before, it still felt like a magical experience. She knew he loved watching her ride him, and she started slowly, unbuttoning his shirt that she'd worn as a nightgown as she did. Watching his eyes burn with desire only heightened her longing. 

"You're a goddess," he whispered as the fabric fell away. 

She smirked as she swooped down to claim his mouth as he thrust his hips up into her, hitting the spot he knew she liked. He could feel the vibrations of her moaning with his tongue in her mouth. She rolled her hips in time with him, her pussy clenching him. He groaned against her lips, “Oh god, Sakura, if you keep this up, you know I’m going to come." 

“I know, darling, that’s why I’m doing it.”

He hung on for a few minutes more of the heavenly torture before he came deep within her, his body trembling with the pent up energy. Seeing him come drove her over the edge again and she came hard, whimpering his name. It felt as if she melted into his chest, their breathing gradually slowing as their heartbeats matched each other. 

It felt as if everything in her life had led them to each other, had built them for each other. It was amazing that out of all the brokenness of their pasts, something so beautiful and perfect had come. That was Sakura's last thought as sleep took her.

 OoO*OoO*OoO

They woke a few hours later to the phone ringing. The storm was still raging outside. Sakura's heart fell as she saw Ino's picture on the screen; surely, the florist wasn't going to bring all the flowers in that mess. "Hey, Pig," she said, trying to sound happy. 

"Says the woman getting married in the mud," Ino said in a surprisingly upbeat voice. "So obviously we're not doing the garden, but that's okay. I've got all the things packaged up. I'm thinking we'll do the ceremony itself in the dining room that no one ever uses. You guys never did get around to getting a table, did you?" 

"Well, no..." 

"Perfect!" Ino said. "Anyway, then we'll do the reception in the living room and kitchen. It'll be a bit packed with all the Inuzuka, but hey, that's what wedding are all about, right. Getting people together." Her laughter slightly bordered on maniacal. 

"Um, yes..." 

"Great, I'll see you in about a half hour." The other line went dead. 

 "Ino's on her way," Sakura said as she hung up the phone. 

"Great," Kakashi drew out the word as he scrubbed the side of his face with his palm. 

He went to take a shower, and Sakura went to the kitchen to start the coffee. On her way, she found Chie, curled up in Sasuke's cloak in front of his shrine in her room. Her mind went to a conversation they'd had when Chie had first come to live with her, and she'd found her sleeping there. "I don't remember my father or my first mother," she'd said, her gaze on Sasuke's picture. "He was the first adult to be kind to me." As strange as it was, it often felt as if she mourned his passing more than Sakura did, but perhaps that was only because he'd been gone so long for Sakura and had been such an anomaly in Chie's life. 

Crouching down beside Chie, Sakura gently put her hand on the girl's shoulder. "Come on, honey, it's time to get up," she said, gently shaking her. 

Chie gave her a weary smile as she looked at the window. "You said a wedding was like a party," she said. "Will people come if it's raining?" 

Thinking back to Kakashi's words the night before, Sakura said, "It doesn't matter if anyone else comes, but I know for sure that Ino-san is on her way." 

The little girl's eyes lit up. "Is Inojin coming too?" she asked, a faint blush rising on her cheeks. 

Sakura smothered a chuckle as she stood up and said, "Yes, I think he's going to be helping her set up." 

"Oh!" Chie said, almost stumbled over the cloak as she got up quickly. "I need to get dressed!" 

OoO*OoO*OoO

They were halfway done, setting up the chairs in the dining room when the lights went out. "You've got to be joking!" Sakura groaned as her eyes adjusted to the scant light that bled its way in through the thick rain outside. 

"Maybe it will come on in a bit," Kakashi said hopefully, but as the minutes ticked on it became apparent that it wasn't just a power surge. 

"Perhaps we ought to reschedule..." Sakura started. 

"No," Ino interrupted. "Give me a minute!" She walked out of the room, dialing her cell phone, and Sakura fought against tears as Inojin and Chie kept on arranging chairs as best they could in the low light. 

"Hey," Kakashi said softly as he walked up to Sakura and wrapped his arms around her. "It's going to be okay." 

"How? Everything's going wrong." 

He chuckled, kissing her forehead. "Do you remember what I said last night? Nothing will stop this wedding. Anyways, I heard it's lucky for it to rain on your wedding day." 

"Rain is one thing, a typhoon is another," she said miserably as the tears spilled over despite her best efforts. 

"Hey, Ino and Inojin showed up. Naruto's going to show up with his family. You know Genma and Anko are coming. Tenzo never let a storm stop him, and Atsuko's too stubborn to let it stop her either," he said, rubbing her back. 

His words worked like a balm to her spirit. The logical, medically trained part of her knew it was pregnancy hormones that were making everything seem so hopeless, but she was sorry that their wedding day was turning out so badly. She'd wanted everything to be beautiful and perfect for Kakashi's sake, and it seemed as if it were all crumbling. 

"Don't worry about a thing," Ino announced as she came back in the room. "I've got everything covered." 

"How?" Sakura asked, wiping away her tears. 

"That," Ino said as she took Sakura by the hand and led her towards the door, "is not something you ought to be worrying about. You need to go and scrub that face of yours and make yourself presentable because we're going to have people here a bit earlier than expected. I'll be up to help you as soon as I'm done here, but no pregnancy tears allowed." 

OoO*OoO*OoO

Kakashi was curious about what she'd done, but a half hour later, his questions were answered when the front door opened and Anko and Genma both walked in, dripping wet and carrying boxes. "You do know it's your fuckin' fault this deluge is happening, right?" Genma grumbled around his senbon as he set the box down on a table and started unpacking mismatched candles. "It ain't fuckin' natural, you being married." 

"Oh, hush," Anko said with a sly smile as she swatted him. "You're one to talk." 

Kakashi's gaze went to Anko's finger where there was a new black ring with three rubies. "What? You guys got engaged?" 

"Married, actually," Anko said with a laugh. "Last Thursday." 

"I can't believe you didn't tell me!" Kakashi said, looking between the two of them, but Genma just shrugged. 

"Wasn't anybody there but us and Naruto, oh and Shikamaru, but only because he had to witness it." 

"Naruto kept it a secret?" Kakashi felt as if the world had slightly tilted its access. 

"It's a kind of sad day when you're more of a gossip than he is, isn't it?" Genma asked with an amused smirk. 

"You're an ass," Kakashi said, but he was smiling. "Congratulations, both of you!" 

A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door. Naruto and his family were there, all carrying bags of candles and lanterns. A few minutes later, Raido and his wife showed up with similar packages. One after another, people showed up bringing more lighting to add to the house so that soon it looked as if they'd always intended it to be a candlelight service. 

Tenzo looked up at the wall clock, "You know, as your best man, I've got to warn you that you probably ought to go get ready. We've got everything covered here." 

He hadn't been nervous until he walked into their bedroom and saw the montsuki haori hakama hanging there. Sakura was getting ready in one of the guest rooms, which had been her idea so that he wouldn't see her until just before the wedding. At first that had seemed like a great idea, but as his fingers fumbled over knots, he realized that maybe it was just good for giving him jitters. _Oh, god. What if I stutter over the vows?_ he thought with horror. 

Going to the window, he picked up the frame of their Team 7 photo. The day it had been taken, he would have never imagined that this day would happen. It was strange to look at it now, almost as if he were looking at four other people. Decades had a way of rounding off the edges and blurring lines that had once seemed so definitive.  

There was a knock on the door, and he almost dropped the frame. Recovering, he set it down and turned as he said, "Come in." He'd expected it to be Tenzo or Genma, maybe even Naruto or Raido, but it was Mrs. Haruno. They'd only spoken briefly since that disastrous day he'd asked her permission to marry Sakura; it was mainly of his choosing as he was good at avoiding people. Now, though, there was nowhere to escape to. "Sakura's in the bedroom two doors down, on the right," he said with what he hoped passed as a warm smile. 

She returned his smile, stepping in and closing the door behind her. "I'm actually here to talk to you," she said softer than she normally spoke. For once, the normally brash woman seemed sheepish. It chipped away at the barriers he'd set up. "I wanted to tell you that I'm very sorry for the way I acted when you asked to marry Sakura." 

There was no guile in her voice, and perhaps because of it, he found the courage to say, "You don't have anything to be sorry about. You were right. I wasn't good for Sakura the way I was." 

"But you've changed," Mrs. Haruno said with a smile and a laugh. "Or maybe you haven't so much. You were always good to her. Always. In the last few months, though... Kakashi, I've never seen her so happy, and I just wanted to thank you, and tell you that, for whatever it's worth, you both have my full blessing." 

"Thank you."

For a moment there was an awkward silence hanging between them and then Mrs. Haruno took the few steps between them and wrapped her arms around him. "I've always wanted a son!" she said happily just before she pulled back, wiping away tears. "I'm going to go let the guys know they can come in now." 

When she left, most of his nervousness seemed to have gone with her, so he was able to laugh when Genma clapped him on the back and said, "Don't worry, man, it's as easy as falling off a log. I mean, granted, I've only got a nine-day head start on you, but fuck it. You're gonna be fine." 

"We're finally done lighting all the candles and placing everything," Tenzo said. "Ino wanted me to tell you that Sakura's ready and that you're expected to be down in exactly 12 minutes." 

"I've only got one question," Kakashi whispered as he leaned in towards Tenzo. 

"What is it, senpai?" 

"Did you bring Kamin?" 

It was amusing to watch Tenzo's face rapidly turn red. "Uh, I, yes." 

"Good man," Kakashi said as he gently slapped Tenzo's cheek. "You'll be next. Just wait." The sound of people talking and laughing downstairs had drowned out the sound of rain and it seemed as if Sakura's words from years back had, at last, come true. All of Kohona had shown up, even in a downpour, to watch the two of them become the family they always were. 


	40. Chapter 40

A moment later, the voices below became markedly louder and slightly less jovial. The three men only had a moment to exchange a quizzical look before the door burst open and Ino stood there, looking slightly frazzled. "You," she said, pointing at Tenzo. "I need you. Now."

"Me?" Tenzo pointed to himself, his already large eyes widening.

"What's wrong?" Kakashi asked.

"Wrong?" Ino said, her voice climbing an octave as she put on a tense smile. "There's nothing wrong. Everything's under control."

Shouts started down below, and Kakashi's eyebrows shot upward. "You," he said, with a pointed look at Ino, "are not a very good liar. It smells like wet dog in here." Suddenly the puzzle pieces fell into place. "The Inuzuka just showed up, didn't they?" 

Ino groaned as she grabbed Tenzo's hand and yanked him towards the door. "Yes, all of them, and now there's not enough room for everyone in the house, which is why I need Wood Boy to do his thing and add onto the house." 

"Th-that's not really what the Mokuton Genkai is supposed to be used for," Tenzo stammered as she dragged him along. 

"I'm sorry, is there some kind of genkai police who's going to arrest us for this?! There is literally not enough room in this house to hold all our guests. If the police come they can wait in the rain until the wedding’s over," they heard Ino snap from the hall just after the duo disappeared. 

"Poor bastard," Genma said as he leaned against the table. "Think we ought to go supervise?" 

"By 'supervise' do you mean watch Ino yank Tenzo around by the nose? Normally I'd say yes," he said leaning out the door to look up and down the hallway, "but there's an awful lot of people downstairs and my guess is that you'll make it through but I'd be expected to talk to all of them and..." Kakashi sighed and shrugged. “I don’t want to.”

In a few minutes, the whole house shuddered as if there was an earthquake. Moments later, there was a flash of white by the door. Kakashi ran out in time to catch Sakura at the head of the stairs. "What was that?" she asked. 

Kakashi couldn’t help himself and laughed. "Ino didn't tell you? Tenzo's adding on to the house to fit everyone." 

Sakura huffed as she rolled her eyes. "She could have at least come and warned me. I'm..." Her eyes grew wide as she looked at Kakashi in horror. "Ahh! What are you doing here? You weren’t supposed to see me! I wanted to surprise you when I came downstairs and now it's all ruined." 

“Nothing’s ruined,” he said, as he pulled her closer and gave her a very long and grabby kiss. “See? You look fine. I just checked.”

Sakura narrowed her eyes. “That’s not—that’s not even what—Your eyes were _closed_.”

”Really? I’ll have to check again, just to make sure.” He kissed her again, even longer this time. “Yep, nothing’s ruined. Also, if my eyes were closed, how could I see your outfit?”

"Ugh! What are you doing out the room, Billboard Brow! You were supposed to wait for me!" Ino's voice broke the moment as she came back up with stairs with Tenzo in tow. "Well, anyway, thanks to Wood Boy..."

"I wish you wouldn't call me that," Tenzo muttered under his breath.

But Ino just steamrolled over him, continuing, "...we've finally got enough room for everybody, and he promises to regrow everything he had to flatten to expand. _And_  it no longer smells like wet dog everywhere." 

Sakura smiled as she hugged Tenzo, causing him to blush slightly. "Thanks, Captain Yamato." 

OoO*OoO*OoO

The wedding started a bit later than she'd planned it to, but as Sakura walked into the candlelit addition that Tenzo had built, her eyes began to water. Flowering vines snaked around the ceiling beams creating an ethereal look. She heard Chie give a small squeal before she clapped her hands to her mouth, but Sakura only had eyes for Kakashi. He was beaming at her as she walked down the aisle towards him and Naruto, who was in full Hokage dress for the ceremony. She had expected nervous jitters as she walked into the room with all those people's eyes on her, but with every footstep, the rest of the world disappeared and soon it was just her and him, teal eyes locked on slate-colored ones. They were in their own universe, and Kakashi hung the moon while Sakura hung the sun. 

Sliding his hand into hers and lacing their fingers together, Kakashi leaned in and whispered. "You managed it." 

"What's that?" she whispered back. 

"Surprising me," he said with a grin that made his eyes light up. "You are _stunning_." 

"On behalf of Sakura and Kakashi, I would like to welcome you all and thank you for braving a tropical storm to help them celebrate their wedding," Naruto said as Sakura and Kakashi both sat down. "Like most of you, I've known them for a long time. It surprised me as much any of you when they became a couple, but the truth is they've always been there for each other. And that's what the best relationships are built on, friendship." Sakura saw his eyes drift to Hinata, who had a faint blush on her cheeks. 

The rest of Naruto's words were lost as Sakura began to think about what that moment meant. There wasn't the giddy feeling, like a hummingbird fluttering about in her chest, that there had been the first time she'd gotten married. This was like the warmth of a thick blanket on a cold night, a feeling that things were right and safe. She almost laughed. 

Naruto poured the sake for them, and they each drank three times from the three cups, each one a bit larger than the last to show the expanding nature of their relationship. The first cup represented the two of them, and the love that they shared for each other. The second represented the Land of Fire and their alligence to it. The last represented the world, to show that their love would eventually impact the entire planet.

When Sakura handed Naruto the last cup, he leaned towards them and said, "Okay, you two can exchange vows now. You did remember to write vows, Kakashi-sensei?" 

"I'm afraid I forgot about it," Kakashi deadpanned, and Sakura almost choked on a laugh. 

Naruto, though, didn't get it. "Well, let's let Sakura go first then," he whispered. 

"After you," Kakashi said to her with an amused smirk. 

She pursed her lips as she shook her head slightly, trying to collect herself enough to speak. "Kakashi," she started out, looking at him as she took his hands in her. "You know me better than anyone else on the planet and have, miraculously, stuck around. You've protected me, trained me, fought alongside me, and eventually became my best friend. I think I've loved you for years now, and just not realized it, because when I look back I see that every time I needed you, you were there, and I promise you that for as long as I live, I'll be there for you too." 

"Sakura-" he started, then sniffed, unfallen tears glistening in his eyes as he drew a deep breath, "Sakura, I spent most of my life without a family, not wanting to let anyone get close to me because getting close usually meant losing them, which meant losing a piece of myself too. You didn't make me feel like I was broken, though. Each day, each year, you made me feel a little more whole. You and Sarada became my family, and now we've got Chie," he said with a smile as he gestured to the little girl who returned his smile and waved back, "and the babies on the way. I don't think you'll ever fully understand the ways you've brought me back to life, and I've never been good enough with words to tell you. But for everything you've done and for everything you are, I love you. I'll spend the rest of my life loving you and trying to be the man you deserve." 

The house thundered with applause and cheers and ugly crying as Naruto turned Kakashi and Sakura around and said, "It's my great honor, as the Hokage, to present to you Mr. and Mrs. Hatake!" 

OoO*OoO*OoO

Sarada went up with her mother to change into something less formal for the reception. "You looked beautiful," Sarada said as she helped her mother untie the kimono. 

"Thanks; it's terribly hot." 

Sarada chuckled as she lay the heavy garment down on the bed, smoothing it carefully. Sakura caught a glimpse of her in the mirror and turned around. "It will be yours one day, you know," she said softly. "It's been in the family for four generations now." She remembered when she was a girl and she'd look at it in her mother's keepsake's chest. Secretly, she thought that her mother's principle objection to Sasuke was that the two of them eloping had deprived her of the chance to have a big wedding. 

"Yeah," Sarada said with a fond smile as turned away from the dress. "But today's about you and Kakashi. I don't want either of you to worry about anything. ChoCho and I are going to watch Chie for as long as you guys need." 

"The honeymoon is only a week," Sakura reminded her with a small chuckle. 

"And plans are made to be flexible," Sarada said with a sly smile. "Especially when you both need a vacation." 

"A vacation from what?" Sakura laughed after she asked. She hadn't has as much time off since she'd graduated from the Academy as she had in the last month. In fact, if she hadn't been planning for the wedding she wasn't entirely sure that she wouldn't have gone crazy. 

"It's not _from what_ but _with whom_ ," Sarada said. 

OoO*OoO*OoO

The afternoon waned into the evening as the party continued and the storm outside slowly calmed into a gentle rain. One after one, their friends toasted them, and their children, and their futures. Sakura laughed as Ino, who was now a bit tipsy, climbed up on a chair. Sticking two fingers between her lips, she gave a shrill whistle and when the room silenced, she said, "I know a lot of you have already said something about the happy couple, but as Forehead's oldest bestest-t friend, I'm absolutely obligated to say something, and this is it: You guys are going to have gorgeous babies. Like seriously. Do you see their cheekbones? It's ludicrous. Obscene, really. I mean, they do have the chance of getting her ginormous forehead, but like one bad trait between two people... Wait, what are you doing, Konohamaru?" 

Her boyfriend had wrapped his arms around her waist and lowered her off the chair, sweeping her into a slow dance and soon she seemed to have forgotten what she'd been doing. Kakashi chuckled as he held his wife a bit tighter, swaying to the music. "It's good to see her relax; I was worried she'd have a stroke," he said. 

"So," Sakura said softly, "still hate parties?" 

"Yes," Kakashi said resolutely, "but I'll put up with them for you." 

"I'll try to keep them down to only one or two a year." 

"I'll hold you to that," he whispered, then kissed her forehead. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel the need to point out that 1) I don't know much about Japanese wedding traditions and so 2) a lot of this is completely made up. Absolutely no disrespect is meant whatsoever. In my headcanon, there isn't a lot of religion in the Naruto-universe, and neither Sakura or Kakashi strike me as especially religious people, so there is no priest or priestess here.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading and commenting! I appreciate your support! ^_^
> 
> Playlist for this Story (in no particular order) 
> 
> Bad Wolves- Zombie
> 
> Kodaline- All I Want
> 
> Hozier- Arsonist's Lullaby
> 
> The Civil Wars- Poison and Wine
> 
> Hozier- Take Me to Church
> 
> Boy Epic- Scars
> 
> Jaymes Young- I'll Be Good
> 
> Down Like Silver- Wolves
> 
> Down Like Silver- Have I Loved
> 
> Leah- Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep
> 
> M.I.A.- Paper Planes (Don't ask, lol. I'm old.) 
> 
> Joan Beaz- Diamonds and Rust


End file.
